So Many Questions

Despite the ANC’s gender policy, only one of the eight newly elected ANC provincial premiers is a woman. Chris Barron asked ANC Women’s League president Angie Motshekga ...

One out of eight. You can’t be happy with that? No, we’re not. We are quite disappointed, quite saddened. Does it mean your gender policy has failed? No, far from it. The mere fact that the ANC spent the whole day dealing with just that item shows its sincerity around the gender policy. It also shows that it is not just a token thing. We’re not saying that just because we have this policy, then, come hell or high water, we are going to stick to it. It is not a numbers game — it is something we take very seriously. Isn’t it hypocritical to make so much of the fact that you have a gender policy when you don’t implement it? You can’t look at it as a numbers game. If the policy is about gender parity, then numbers are important, aren’t they? No, they are. But there are also other considerations. The policy has to be implemented in such a way that all other interests are protected. What you’re telling me is that it takes a back seat to everything else? No, it interacts with other considerations. It doesn’t take a back seat. There were two strong women candidates in Gauteng. Why didn’t you support them? In the context of many other things, we thought it would be best to move with David Makhura. It wasn’t about fighting without considering everything else that was equally important. How much clout does the ANC Women’s League have? We have clout, but it is not just about clout. We are also members of the ANC. It is not as if we come there as outsiders and that which we want we must get, regardless of the ANC’s needs. Where is the evidence of your clout? It’s there. The mere fact that we could force that if we are not able to get seven premiers, then the speakers must be women shows our strength. Also, that in all excos six of the exco members would be women demonstrates our power. It is still very much a man’s party, isn’t it?

It’s a man’s world, isn’t it? Surely the league should be leading the way to ensure that it is not the case in the ANC? The ANC is the only party which takes 50% of women to parliament, the only party in the world which has this level of representation for women. But the leader is still a man, the deputy is a man, the provincial chairmen are men . . .

It’s a man’s world. Four of the top six in the party are men . . .

Exactly, it’s a man’s world.

The secretary-general is a man . . . That’s why we are here. If we didn’t have those challenges, there would be no need for the women’s league. And, as I say, this is the world order — it is not just the ANC order. I don’t know, in the media, how many editors are women. I don’t know how many owners are women. Aren’t you just trying to avoid the fact that although the ANC trumpets its gender policy, it is still

dominated by men? There are ongoing challenges; we are not shying away from it. But as the ANC we can proudly say that we have made great progress. The other parties in parliament have learnt a lot from the ANC.

Not how to elect a woman leader. Didn’t you say there was no woman qualified to be president of the ANC? I never said that. Again, that’s stories in the media. So why didn’t you nominate a woman for president? We were having a press conference announcing our election plans for 2014. A journalist asked if I was going to campaign for a woman president. My answer was that the ANC had already made its decision, so we were not going to put forward a candidate for 2014. You had plenty of time before this, so why didn’t you nominate a woman for president? I am speaking about a specific thing you are alleging me to have said, and I am saying I never said it the way you are putting it. Why didn’t the women’s league nominate a woman for president? If, in our wisdom as the women’s league, we feel we want to give Zuma a second term, it is within our rights to do it. Why didn’t you nominate a woman for deputy president? If we feel we want a man to be deputy president, there can’t be anything wrong in that. We are not anti-men. We are for women, but we are not necessarily anti-men. How deep-rooted is the commitment to gender equity in the ANC? It is very deep-rooted, but it is a constant battle. It will not come easily.