The proposal that removes the obligation for parties to reserve 30% of vacancies in electoral sheets for women and establishes by 20% the percentage of chairs intended for them in the legislatures can deepen the political sub-representation of black women and compromise the supervision of the use of the party fund. The evaluation is from the organization. The proposal for the new Electoral Code is under discussion in the Senate today.
“We are facing a proposal that converts a floor of candidates and represents a recent achievement in a possible ceiling, which is unacceptable. Instead of moving forward, we are regressing decades in the political representation of women, especially black women, who already face structural barriers to access power spaces.”said the racial and gender coordinator of Oxfam Brazil, Barbara Barboza.
According to Barbara, the current requirement of 30% of female candidates allows measuring and charging women’s participation in electoral processes.
“Without the obligation of candidacies, parties tend to invest less in CIS and Trans women campaigns. This can be interpreted as gender and race political violence, that is, it hinders the exercise of women’s political rights.”he said. Barbara also drew attention to the risk of concentration of resources from the party fund.
“Public money intended for elections will be even more focused on the hands of those who already have power, ie white men. In practice, this means less resources for women’s campaigns, especially black women, who already have difficulty accessing the electoral fund.”he explained.
The coordinator also recalled that black women occupy less than 3% of chairs in the House of Representatives, although they represent 28% of the Brazilian population and, based on this, the reform of the Electoral Code can reinforce inequalities rather than combat them.
With information from Agência Brasil
