CPA calls for more women in Parliament

COUNTRIES who are members of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA) want to see more women enter parliament in their respective countries.
This was one of the agendas discussed by speakers of Commonwealth nations during their 33rd CPA conference in New Delhi, India recently.
Speaker of the Bougainville Autonomous House of Representatives Nick Penia, who attended the conference, said the association would like to see more women to be elected as parliamentarian members in their own governments.
Mr Penia revealed that the conference had already set 2015 as the year that 30% of parliamentarians in each country would be women.
In PNG, there is only one woman parliamentarian among her 108 male counterparts, while the Autonomous Bougainville Government (AGB) has three women politicians.
Mr Penia said every member country would have to do more to achieve the target in 2015.
“As the Speaker of the ABG it is a challenging responsibility for my office and the government to ensure that we have more women parliamentarians in the government by the year 2015,” Mr Penia said.
He also urged men in the region to support women in their attempts to enter parliament.
Mr Penia also challenged the women in the region to organise themselves in order to get elected into parliament.