The United Nations agency for gender equality, UN Women, has sought information from the Election Commission (EC) regarding the low representation of women in the 13th parliamentary election and ways to increase their participation.
The matter was disclosed to journalists on Sunday by EC Senior Secretary Akhtar Ahmed following a meeting between the EC and a UN Women delegation at the Election Commission building in Agargaon, Dhaka.
Akhtar Ahmed said the UN Women representatives raised several questions regarding post-election observations based on the experience of the recent election.
“They wanted to know about the low presence of female representatives in the election and discussed ways to increase it. We informed them that there are seven women members of parliament. However, more women had contested the election, and ultimately they must win through the electoral process,” he said.
He further said, “We informed them that there are 57 members of parliament, including 50 reserved seats out of a total of 350 seats. Female representation is expected to increase further in local government elections.”
Referring to efforts to narrow the gender gap among voters, the EC secretary said, “There was previously a gap of three million between male and female voters in the electoral roll. This has now been reduced to 1.8 million, and we are working to reduce it further. We also informed them that there was no violence during this election and no incidents of ballot boxes being snatched.”
When asked whether UN Women had offered any suggestions, he said, “They are already working with us and have said that this cooperation will continue.”
Earlier, the UN Women delegation held a meeting with Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) AMM Nasir Uddin, Election Commissioner Tahmida Ahmed and EC Senior Secretary Akhtar Ahmed.
The UN Women delegation included Assistant Secretary-General and Deputy Executive Director Nyaradzayi Gumbonzvanda, Regional Director Christine Arab, Representative Geetanjali Singh, Deputy Representative Nabaneeta Sinha and Unit Manager Tapati Saha.
