Your Excellency,
One of the high points of the NDC campaign was its pledge to allocate 40% of all positions in its government to women, if it was elected into office. When you were Candidate Mills, you repeated this pledge when you took your turn at the IEA Forum. This pledge was also captured in the NDC Manifesto and was repeated several times on the campaign platform. Indeed when H.E the Vice President, then your running mate, appeared at the Vice Presidential Candidates Encounter with Women, he repeated that pledge and reiterated that your party would not fail Ghanaian women if you were elected to steer the affairs of this great country.
One of the excuses successive governments have given for failing to live up to their campaign pledges to appoint women into various executive and Board positions is that they cannot find adequate numbers of eligible and sufficiently knowledgeable women to appoint. To counter this oft repeated but lame excuse, the Department of Women of the Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs, painstakingly compiled a directory of competent women in all the 10 regions of Ghana, women capable of holding their own at all levels of governance, women who cut across all social classes and have demonstrated competence in various fields of endeavour. This project was undertaken without any political colouration as all those who volunteered information for inclusion in this directory believed politicizing this effort would not be in the best interest of the women of Ghana.
On the 6th of February 2009, a delegation of Women’s groups met with you at the Castle, Osu, and presented a copy of this directory to you, urging you to live up to your word to the women of Ghana. You graciously promised to take that directory into consideration when making your appointments and repeated your pledge of 40% appointments of women into your government. This meeting was timed carefully because you were still in the process of finalizing your appointments and we thought we could assist you meet your oft repeated pledge. On 23rd January 2009, your Spokesperson, Mahama Ayariga in a press briefing, indicated that you, President Mills, will fulfill your promise to women as far as appointments into your government are concerned. In the said statement, you were quoted as saying that your recent ministerial nominations are indicative of your commitment to fulfilling your campaign promise of allocating 40 percent to women in your government.
On 15th April 2009, when you met journalists to brief them on what you had done in your 100 days, you underscored the goodwill your leadership has shown to women as you tried to allocate about 40% of political appointments to women. You stated that under your presidency, the nation has a first woman Speaker of Parliament, Acting Inspector General of Police and Minister of Justice and Attorney General among others.
What is the reality today, 5 months into the term of your NDC administration, when almost all the appointments have been made and announced?
The table below is self explanatory and paints a very gloomy picture of the percentage of females appointed into the Mills Administration to date.
Total number Number of women Percentage
Ministers 38 8 21%
Deputy Ministers 35 7 20%
MMDCEs 164 12 7.3%
Armed Forces Council 11 1 9.09%
Council of State 24 3 12.5%
Economic Advisory Council 10 0 0%
Total 282 32 11%
The total number of appointments made to date, based on information which is in the public domain as at today, Monday 11th May 2009, is 282, out of which only 32, making up 11%, are women.
MR. PRESIDENT, WE ARE TIRED OF TOKENISM. YOU PROMISED US 40% AND WE ARE ONLY ASKING FOR THAT. 3 OR 4 HIGH PROFILE FEMALE APPOINTEES DOES NOT CONSTITUTE 40%, EVEN THOUGH WE APPRECIATE THE EFFORT.
YOU HAVE A VERY LONG WAY TO GO TO ASSURE US, WOMEN OF THIS COUNTRY THAT YOU ARE INDEED DIFFERENT, THAT YOU WERE NOT MERELY PAYING LIP SERVICE TO US TO WIN VOTES, AND THAT WE CAN TAKE YOUR WORD SERIOUSLY. YOU CANNOT EVEN USE THE JADED EXCUSE OF NOT KNOWING WHERE THE WOMEN ARE. OR ARE WE JUST GOING TO GET AN APOLOGY FROM YOU BECAUSE OF YOUR UNWILLINGNESS OR INABILITY TO LIVE UP TO YOUR OWN CAMPAIGN PROMISE?
TIME AND THE OPPORTUNITY TO MAKE UP THE NUMBERS ARE FAST RUNNING OUT AS YOU HAVE ALMOST COMPLETED YOUR APPOINTMENTS. MAYBE, IF YOU APPOINT ONLY WOMEN TO THE FEW REMAINING DIRECTORSHIPS AND COMMITTEES, YOU MAY IMPROVE THIS VERY SAD PICTURE A BIT.
Your predecessor tried and was able to make about 25%. At 11%, you have a very long way to go to catch up with, overtake his record and usher women of Ghana into your ‘better Ghana’.
There are very few women occupying senior management positions, but talk in town is that you are in the process of removing even the few who were appointed by the previous administration, including the Chief Justice, Acting Director of the Ghana Immigration Service and Managing Director of Tema Development Corporation (TDC). I have already fallen victim to political arm twisting even though I did not occupy a public position. My heart bleeds for my hard working sisters, women of proven competence and capability, and I sincerely hope the rumor mill is just working over-time and there is no truth in that.
I was hoping against hope that the appointments of Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives would help you make up the numbers, but when the list was finally published, it was beyond disappointing and made me lose all hope. 12 women out of 164!!!! I hear most of them are also poised to fail the approval process because they cannot or will not pay the bribes being demanded by the “honourable” Assembly Members. This is happening in today’s Ghana and you have turned a blind eye to it! What happened to your much trumpeted call against corruption, or is this deep seated canker called by another name when it is perpetrated by your men? This will however be the subject of another open letter to you.
To Shama and the other Districts that have rejected or are poised to reject the female appointees, it is your loss and you have sacrificed progress and development for short term monetary gain. Hard luck to Emelia Arthur and my other sisters in the struggle.
Your Excellency, Mr. President, I sincerely hope you will take this note in good faith and act timeously to restore our confidence in you and your government. I wish you a blessed day.
Yours sincerely,
Ursula Owusu,
Woman of Ghana
