Be gender sensitive, media told Women Affairs, Gender and Community Development Minister Nyasha Chikwinya officiates at a consultative and sensitisation workshop for women in decision-making in Mutare last Friday
Women Affairs, Gender and Community Development Minister Nyasha Chikwinya officiates at a consultative and sensitisation workshop for women in decision-making in Mutare last Friday

Women Affairs, Gender and Community Development Minister Nyasha Chikwinya officiates at a consultative and sensitisation workshop for women in decision-making in Mutare last Friday

Tendai Gukutikwa Mutare Bureau
Minister of Women Affairs, Gender and Community Development Nyasha Chikwinya has reminded the media to be gender sensitive and not sideline female politicians in their line of work.

Minister Chikwinya, who is also Member of National Assembly for Mutare South, said the media should improve its coverage of female leaders in society and focus more on their role in community development, rather than their scandals.

Officiating at a consultative and sensitisation workshop for women in decision making in Mutare last Friday, Minister Chikwinya said though the number of female politicians had been on a slight, but notable rise over the years, there was still concern since there was no ample coverage of women issues in the media.

“The coverage of politicians in the media has been dominated by male politicians,” she said. “It is sad to note that women, even female parliamentarians are mainly covered in the media when it is about child care, their dressing, looks and all other unnecessary issues that are given precedence over progressive and developmental role of women in society.

“There is need for the media to make a paradigm shift and stop underrating women, as well as overrating men. We are equal and both deserve equal coverage. We need to promote each other and help balance our works.

“It is a fact that women parliamentarians are not receiving adequate coverage, hence the need to explore ways to improve women parliamentarian coverage.

“We do not expect the media to be a mirror of the patriarchal society, but an agent of change towards gender equality.

“We are tired of the derogative and negative reporting that has always characterised media coverage of women parliamentarians and women in general. The media has a critical role in doing away with the gender stereotypes that have been hardened by centuries of socialisation, yet more often than not, the media has been part of the problem and not the solution.”

Speaking during the same function, Mr Lloyd Pswarayi, who conducted a research on the Women’s Quota, said female parliamentarians should explore ways to effectively engage the media for them to be visible and play their role in achieving gender equality.

Titled ‘Participation but no voice: A Preliminary report on the women’s quota in Zimbabwe’, the research states that in the cases that females were used as sources by the media, attention was often on their gender and womanhood and that the scope of coverage was never about the substance of what women talk about, but in the most trivial things that sell the paper.

“Of the 625 political stories carried out by the media, 85 percent belonged to males and 15 percent to females,” the research noted. “The private media’s sourcing was no different. Of the 820 sources they used, 87 percent were males, while 13 percent were females (MMPZ, 2012).

“We cannot avoid the media and women parliamentarians have to understand the media better and also find ways to pack their messages better for onward transmission to society through the media.”

Mr Pswarayi challenged female parliamentarians to explore ways of effectively engaging the media in order for them to be visible and play their role in achieving gender equality.

He said it was also imperative that female politicians engaged new media technologies like the social media.

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