Parliamentary Centre Delivers Video Conference Training of Trainers Course on Gender Awareness

The representation of women in Parliament is essential for access to decision-making positions which can provide a platform for articulating women’s concerns in pursuit of attainment of the goal of gender equality. The anticipated political transition in Uganda from a movement to a multiparty political system, alerted the women parliamentarians to the danger of losing their current level of representation. As a strategy to mitigate that risk, the women embarked on an election preparation process by convening a conference in May 2004. The conference which explored various measures that could be adopted for retention and if possible, increase the current level of representation, culminated in development of a Women’s agenda. The gender sensitivity training course was thus designed to equip women parliamentarians with the tools for downstream training which will ensure the permeation of gender awareness throughout society and improve the potential for more women to be elected to parliament. The trainers are expected to conduct in country gender sensitivity training of all relevant arms of the executive, local government and at grass roots level.

Video Conference Summary

The VC training involved two Parliamentary Centre staff (PC) and the support of Uganda Women’s Parliamentary Association (UWOPA), which was responsible for coordination of participants on the ground. The three-hour video conference on gender awareness was delivered from Ottawa by PC staff. The training module commenced with a definition of gender, discussed some gender issues, identified some of the influential change agents and concluded with ways to effect change in attitudes.

Participants were provided with the course material prior to the video conference. The presentation was delivered in PowerPoint form. Instead of intermittent appearance of the presenter and slides, which is the usual PC presentation format, there was a continuous presentation of all slides, followed by a discussion at the end. The presenter encouraged follow-up through use of email or fax where internet facilities are not available.

Advantages of Video Conference Training

The video conference technology facilitated an interactive learning environment at very low cost. Although only 15 people participated in the training session, the video conference room in Kampala had the capacity to accommodate up to 30 people. The discussion between the conference facilitator in Ottawa and participants in Uganda resulted in identification of the following actions to be taken by parliamentarians as part of their election preparation process:

An impact assessment study of women parliamentarians’ achievement within parliament and in their constituencies.
The transformation from quantity to quality of women parliamentarians to be achieved through gender budgeting training which will equip women with the analysis tools and confidence to articulate and defend issues on gender in committees and during question time in parliament.
An orientation program for new parliamentarians to enhance the women’s confidence by reducing fear of making mistakes.
Women parliamentarians to seek further support in developing training programs that can be utilised to change society’s attitudes.
Women’s success as well as failure stories to be documented and made available as a source of encouragement for both new and experienced parliamentarians.
To establish an election fund for women to overcome the election finance obstacle.
To seek support in developing a civic education program for changing people’s attitudes towards women.

Expected Results

A report has been produced for circulation to all other gender network members.
Lessons learnt will be incorporated into a handbook on Gender Awareness for Parliamentarians in Africa being developed by PC.
The VC participants will develop a training program for extending gender awareness to the rest of the electorate in Uganda.
An increase in the number of women that will be elected to Parliament in the next election.
An increase in the number of women that will be appointed to decision-making positions in parliament and government.




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ACPSP: Gender Equality Network