/ 22 June 2007

More must be done to empower women, says report

South Africa lacks women in high positions, the Public Service Commission (PSC) has found.

A lot still needed to be done to empower women, the PSC said in a report released on Friday.

”Critical in this endeavour is the creation of an enabling environment to ensure that women’s talents and potential are harnessed and nurtured for the benefit of the South African society as a whole,” it said.

”The challenge to institutions in the public service is to change their organisational culture in order to be more responsive to the needs of women civil servants,” it said.

Policies and programmes that allowed for gender inequalities had to be reshaped.

The PSC study was conducted from April 2005 until March 2006.

It found that women’s access to executive power and decision-making had improved since the 1994 elections.

Women held, on average 31,2% of the senior positions in national departments — more than the 30% target.

There were even higher numbers of women in senior positions in traditionally male-dominated departments such as public works and transport.

In provincial departments, women held 29,8% of the senior positions.

Most were in North West at 33,4%, followed by Limpopo at 32,5% and Gauteng and Mpumalanga at 30,6% each.

There were fewest senior female staff in the Western Cape at 23%. — Sapa