MEMBERS OF Switzerland’s parliament have elected a fourth female member to its executive council, which puts women politicians in the majority for the first time. The move propels the country to the forefront of sexual equality in politics, four decades after it granted women the vote.
The election of Simonetta Sommaruga of the Social Democratic party to the seven-member Swiss federal council means there are now four women and three men at the helm of the country’s political system. Accepting her new role in French, Italian and German, Ms Sommaruga said the government should work hard to further the rights of minorities.
“The majority must take into account all minorities, whether they be cultural, linguistic, religious, political or of any other kind,” she said. MPs, who had been engaged in the four-round vote since the early hours, applauded.
In a country which only gave women the vote in national elections in 1971 – and in which one canton blocked them from local votes until 1990 – the creation of the first female-dominated federal council has been greeted as a symbolic leap forward.
“I think it’s wonderful,” Anders Johnsson, secretary general of the Geneva-based Inter-Parliamentary Union said. “When it comes to the executive, most countries drag their feet.”
Before the vote, Social Democrat chairman Christian Levrat said a majority female government would be an “essential, decisive step”.
Switzerland joins Finland as a country with a female-majority government. Of the 20 ministers in the Finnish cabinet, 11 are women, including prime minister Mari Kiviniemi. Finland’s president, Tarja Halonen, is also a woman. Spain and Norway also have strong female representation in senior government positions.
In the multiparty Swiss cabinet, Ms Sommaruga (50) will join the federal council president and economics minister Doris Leuthard, foreign minister Micheline Calmy-Rey and justice minister Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf along with their three male colleagues, Johann Schneider-Ammann, Didier Burkhalter and Ueli Maurer.
Ms Sommaruga’s election was prompted by the resignation of the transport minister Moritz Leuenberger. Observers say Switzerland’s propulsion of women to top political jobs has been caused at least in part by its commitment to grassroots activism and flexible working hours. Even some of the most powerful MPs work part-time, meaning women with families can more easily hold office.
However, many said the vision of sexual equality in the executive gives a misleading impression of Swiss advances. Women are still outnumbered three to one in parliament, while few have made it to the top of the business world.
“Particularly compared with the US and Scandinavia, there are far fewer high-level women in business,” said Doris Aebi, a recruitment consultant in Zurich.
– (Guardian service)
