Kemi Akapo will not be seeking re-election
Three women have made same choice and councillor hopes ‘people take note of that’
Months away from her first term as a Peterborough city councillor coming to a close, Town Ward’s Kemi Akapo says she is choosing not to run again.
And while she says there are many reasons why she’s choosing not to seek re-election, she still wants women and female-identifying candidates to run and create an even better, more diverse council.
“We need women in that space,” says Akapo.
In the fall, Peterborough will go into a municipal election, with Akapo being the third councillor to announce she is not running.
Her future plans include going back to school to get a master’s degree, and she says between that and a full-time job, she wouldn’t be doing city council justice.
As Akapo steps away from running again for city council, two other women on council, Mayor Diane Therrien and Coun. Kim Zippel, have also made the same decision.
“I hope people take note of that,” Akapo says.
Women in politics receive far more criticism and expectation than their male counterparts, she says, and while that isn’t the only reason for her decision to leave council chambers, “every drop adds to the bucket.”
“Politics is not known to be friendly toward women, or people who are not cis-gendered men,” she says.
But Akapo also says she doesn’t want those concerns to scare off any women from running in this year’s election, and she encourages any female or female-identifying residents to run.
“Try going with eyes wide open to the challenges you might face because of your gender or sexual identity,” she says.
Looking back at her term, Akapo says she’s proud her council was able to pass such important policy documents like the transportation master plan, the official plan and the cycling master plan.
But because the job requires so many hours of commitment, but isn’t considered to be full-time, it restricts how many people can do it.
“It really does favour people who are independently wealthy, so they don’t need another income, or people who are retired, or people who have partners and say, ‘you can focus on being a councillor and I’ll take care of the rest.’ ”
There are some things Akapo says she’d like to see change, like city council becoming a full-time position, and the introduction of term limits to raise turnover. And while she says she’s not opposed to running again in the future, she’ll continue to volunteer and help out her community.
“I cannot stay idle for long.”