Committee Legacy Report, 2019 – 2024

Meeting report

The Chairperson indicated that the meeting may commence.

She flagged her concern regarding the low attendance of the Multi-Party Women’s Caucus meetings compared to the large number of women in Parliament.

The Committee noted the apologies of Ms N Gantsho (ANC), Ms D Mahlangu (ANC, Mpumalanga), Ms M Gomba (ANC), Ms C Labuschagne (DA, Western Cape), Ms S Boshoff (DA, Mpumalanga), Ms D Christians (DA, Northern Cape), Ms Zulu, Ms T Breedt (FF Plus), Ms C Visser (DA, North West), Ms B Mabe (ANC).

Although the Caucus formed a quorum of 15 members, the Committee had received 13 apologies. The low attendance of the Caucus meetings was one of the concerns incorporated into the Committee Legacy Report.

Multi-Party Women’s Caucus Legacy Report, 2019 – 2024

Ms Tembakazi Mpapela, Content Advisor, took the Caucus through its Legacy Report for the Sixth Parliament.

Discussion

Dr Chana Pilane-Majake (ANC) shared the concern about the low attendance of the Multi-Party Women’s Caucus meetings.

She recommended the Seventh Parliament take initiatives and encourage more women participation in the transformation in the economic sector. She highlighted the need for improved strategies in the economic advancement of women. She commended her party, the ANC, for its efforts to promote women’s interests. For instance, the project management unit encouraged and assisted women in getting into predominantly male-dominated sectors such as mining. Such projects even assisted women to tap into available capital resources in order to help women succeed in those sectors.

She flagged that the conveners of the national gender machinery are at a slower pace and complained that she hardly heard of any of its activities recently. She suggested that the Caucus should encourage convening more of those meetings and activities. The agenda of the national gender machinery should be aligned with that of the Caucus since it is about capacitating women in South Africa.

She recommended that the Multi-Party Women’s Caucus should develop a system to include its counterparts at the provincial and local levels in the Caucus meetings.

She indicated that items such as study tours should be included in the Committee’s annual budget.

Ms M Semenya (ANC) concurred with the view that the Multi-Party Women’s Caucus should collaborate with other spheres of legislatures, municipalities and other international structures. There is a need to look at how other spheres of government may infuse the programmes of the Multi-Party Caucus.

The Chairperson commented that the points Dr Pilane-Majake referred to were covered in the report, but the only variations were of different wordings and phrases.

Speaking on gender quotas, Ms N Adoons (ANC) urged female MPs to robustly engage with their political parties to ensure that women are well-represented in all structures. She commented that the ANC, her party, ensures that women are represented in all structures.

She recommended that the Seventh Parliament should also focus on mental health issues. She observed that many young people are struggling with their mental health and unfortunately, many of them end up committing suicide.

She noted that a lot of work centred around girl children, but more programmes should be devised to mentor boy children as many are doing drugs at an early age.

The adoption of the legacy report was moved by Ms D Mabiletsa (ANC) and seconded by Ms Z Nkomo (ANC).

The legacy report was duly adopted.

Committee minutes

Minutes of 30 November 2023 and 7 March 2024 were duly adopted.

Chairperson’s closing remarks

The Chairperson thanked everyone for their participation in the meeting and reiterated the issue of poor attendance and participation which she had observed in the meeting. The participation in these Caucus meetings mirrors the treatment of women in society, where the pace of transformation is not rapid enough. The Caucus should have had this meeting yesterday but failed to reach a quorum. She was aware that many Members of the Caucus are chairpersons of other committees. Since most parliamentary committees are busy finalising their committee business, she recommended that the next Parliament should look into this so as not to make Members straddle two meetings at the same time.

She thanked the Caucus researcher and content advisor for their work.

Ms M Hlengwa (IFP) applauded the work of the Caucus for having introduced the value of cultural activities at schools since 2021. She noted the input which the Minister of Basic Education had made on creative art and remarked that this Caucus’s initiative is to reap its fruits.

The Chairperson adjourned the meeting.