FEMALE CADRE WORK OF VIETNAM WOMEN'S UNION

Particularly, in politics, Resolution No. 11-NQ/TW dated 27 April, 2007 of the Politburo o­n “Women work in the period of stepped-up national industrialization and modernization” has identified the objectives "by year 2020, striving for the percentage of 25% or higher of female participants in Party committees at all levels; the percentage of 35% - 40% of female deputies to the National Assembly and members of people’s councils at all levels. Agencies and units with women representing 30% or more of the total number of their staff and employees will have women holding key leading positions. The leading agencies of the Party, National Assembly, State and Government will have a percentage of female staff and employees appropriate to the gender equality goal”. In line with Resolution No. 11-NQ/TW, the National Strategy o­n Gender Equality for 2011-2020 period has defined the first target: "To intensify women’s participation in managerial and leading positions in order to gradually narrow gender gap in the political field”.

The Resolution is the basic legal framework to ensure gender equality rights and opportunities in politics for remarkable advancement of women leaders and managers. Currently, the percentage of female deputies to the National Assembly, Legislature XIII is 24.4%, the percentages of female members of People's Councils at provincial, district and commune levels are 25.2%, 24.6%, and 21.7% respectively. The percentages of female members of the Party Central Committee andParty committees at provincial, district and commune levels are 8.57%, 11.3%, 15.7% and 18.3% respectively. At high ranking level, there are 02 female members of the Politburo, 01 female Secretary of the Party Central Committee and 01 female Vice President of the State. However, due to different causes, compared to the target of Resolution No. 11-NQ/TW, the proportion of female leaders and managers is still much lower and does not fully reflect women’s participation in the labor force and their contributions to the country development. Moreover, the percentage of female deputies to the National Assembly tends to decrease, especially in the recent four tenures. The proportion of women at key positions at different levels is low and most of them hold deputy positions.

North Central Regional Seminar "Enhancing women’s participation in politics". Source: baohatinh.vn

In 2015 the Party Congress at local levels will take place towards the 12th National Party Congress and 2016 is the year of elections of the National Assembly and People's Councils at different levels, therefore, the VWU has identified women work as o­ne of its four key tasks in 2014 and implemented a series of practical and effective activities to promote women’s participation in politics:

1. Developing a proposal to the CPV Politburo and Secretariat for their intensified guidance to the Party committees of lower levels to ensure the targeted percentage of women in the Party committees of 2015-2020 tenure;

2. Reviewing and analyzing current situation of female leaders and managers from national to local levels;

3. Developing a comprehensive report o­n the situation of female leaders and managers at different levels and VWU efforts in giving advice and recommendations to ensure women’s participation in leadership and management positions in the coming time;

4. Collaborating with the Party Central Committee Comission for Organization to send 12 delegations to work with a number of central agencies andParty committees of some provinces/cities having difficulty in women work to discuss their recent achievementsas well as problems, lessons learned, and solutions in this area in the coming time;

5. Signing and promulgating the Collaboration Program between the Central Committee of the Vietnam Fatherland Front and the Vietnam Women’s Union (31^st December, 2014) for promoting women’s participation in the 14^th National Assembly and People's Councils at different levels for 2016-2021 tenure;

6. Cooperating with National Assembly Committee o­n Social Affairs, the group of National Assembly female deputies, the National Committee for the Advancement of Women in Vietnam to organize 6 regional seminars (including 2 events in the Southeast and North Central regions of Vietnam chaired by the VWU) o­n "Enhancing women’s participation in politics". The seminars were forums for participants to exchange information and experiences o­n female cadre work and to propose to the Party and State more effective mechanisms and policies aimed at facilitating women to fully use their capacities and intelligence, thus actively contributing to promoting national industrialization and modernization andgender equality;

7. Women’s unions at local levels have also been active in female cadre work by reviewing the situation of local women cadres and working with relevant agencies in order to propose to local Party commitees convincing measures to increase women’s participation in leadership and management, especially in local Party committees in the next term.

Signing Ceremony of Collaboration Program between Vietnam Fatherland Front and Vietnam Women’s Union o­n December 31st, 2014

In 2015, the VWU will organize further activities to increase the percentage of women in Party committees at all levels, in the National Assembly and People's Councils such as actively advising Party committees at all levels o­n measures to ensure the targeted percentage of women participating in Party committees at all levels for 2015-2020 period; collecting, analyzing information and reporting o­n female cadres participation in Party commitees at all levels and evaluating VWU female cadres work; organizing an international seminar to share experiences in promoting women’s participation in politics; implementing the Collaboration Program with the Central Committee of the Vietnam Fatherland Front; conducting needs assessment for enhancing VWU capacity to participate in the elections of the National Assembly and people’s councils, needs assessment of female candidates for their capacity building; organizing training courses for improving VWU staff capacity to participate in the election process and other activities