Cuban Women in Parliament: Much More than Just Numbers

It´s not at all accidental that the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) indicates https://data.ipu.org/women-ranking?month=7&year=2022  that the Cuban Parliament is one of the five worldwide where there’s gender parity, and the second globally with the highest proportion of deputies, 53.4% ​​of the total.

These statistics are the result of decades of repeated efforts to achieve gender equity in Cuban society and, as the president of the National Assembly, Esteban Lazo, pointed out, https://www.parlamentocubano.gob.cu/noticias/cuba-nuevamente-el-second-country-of-the-world-with-the-highest-proportion-of-women-in-the-parlament this result ratifies the majority presence and tangible presence of women in several sectors of our society, including the legislative arena, as an achievement of the Cuban Revolution.

An entire political will supports the application and creation of policies that favor Cuban women, including the National Program for the Advancement of Women as well as the new Family Code, which will be submitted to a referendum in the future and where, from different angles, women's rights to an increasingly fulfilling life are also strengthened and guaranteed, also within the family.

According to IPU’s latest figures, some parliaments are becoming more representative, and the proportion of women and young parliamentarians is increasing. This is so true that the proportion of parliamentarians who are women stands at a historical maximum of 26.2%.

All in all, the Americas region has the highest proportion of female representation globally, with 34.6% of women parliamentarians, a recent IPU report indicates https://www.ipu.org/news/press-releases/2022-06/international-day-parliamentarism-2022-more-diversity-slightly-fewer-functioning-parliaments, which includes 178 national legislative organizations and 14 regional parliamentarian associated agencies, and publishes monthly rankings of the percentage of women in national parliaments.

And it’s paradoxically, while on this small Caribbean island —although much remains to be done— women are increasingly empowered, only 90 miles away, in the most powerful nation of the world, women now see one of their most basic rights threatened with the banning of abortion, dictated there by the Supreme Court.

Translated by Amilkal Labañino / CubaSí Translation Staff