{"id":13364,"date":"2026-08-13T08:52:22","date_gmt":"2026-08-13T08:52:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/?p=13364"},"modified":"2026-08-13T08:53:24","modified_gmt":"2026-08-13T08:53:24","slug":"womens-political-participation-and-leadership-in-zambia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/womens-political-participation-and-leadership-in-zambia\/","title":{"rendered":"Women&#8217;s political participation and leadership in Zambia"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Zambian women make up <strong>50.5% of the population and 53.1% of registered voters<\/strong>, yet remain dramatically underrepresented in political power. Ahead of the 2026 elections, they account for just <strong>13% of parliamentary candidates, 11% of mayoral candidates and 8% of councillor candidates<\/strong>, while only <strong>1 of 14 presidential candidates<\/strong> is a woman. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Behind these figures is a system where women face major financial and institutional barriers. Winning a parliamentary seat can cost around <strong>K3.8 million<\/strong>, while limited access to funding, party structures and harmful stereotypes continues to hold them back. The new electoral system, which reserves <strong>20 parliamentary seats for women<\/strong>, offers an important step forward, but much more is needed to turn Zambia\u2019s female majority into equal representation in political power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-stackable-spacer stk-block-spacer stk--no-padding stk-block stk-17a54ba\" data-block-id=\"17a54ba\"><style>.stk-17a54ba {height:25px !important;}<\/style><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns has-primary-alt-background-color has-background is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-7387b849 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\" style=\"border-radius:15px\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-7387b849 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-large is-resized has-custom-border\"><a href=\"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Nalukui-Milapo-Womens-political-participation-and-leadership-in-Zambia.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\" noreferrer noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"723\" height=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Womens-political-participation-in-Zambia-cover-image-723x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-13368\" style=\"border-radius:3px;width:190px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Womens-political-participation-in-Zambia-cover-image-723x1024.jpg 723w, https:\/\/ahead.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Womens-political-participation-in-Zambia-cover-image-212x300.jpg 212w, https:\/\/ahead.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Womens-political-participation-in-Zambia-cover-image-768x1088.jpg 768w, https:\/\/ahead.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Womens-political-participation-in-Zambia-cover-image-8x12.jpg 8w, https:\/\/ahead.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Womens-political-participation-in-Zambia-cover-image.jpg 906w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 723px) 100vw, 723px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-buttons has-custom-font-size is-content-justification-center is-layout-flex wp-container-core-buttons-is-layout-3e41869c wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex\" style=\"font-size:clamp(14px, 0.875rem + ((1vw - 3.2px) * 0.204), 16px);\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-button has-custom-width wp-block-button__width-75\"><a class=\"wp-block-button__link has-text-color has-tertiary-background-color has-text-color has-background has-link-color has-custom-font-size wp-element-button\" href=\"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Nalukui-Milapo-Womens-political-participation-and-leadership-in-Zambia.pdf\" style=\"font-size:14px\"><strong>Read full report <\/strong>[EN]<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>20 parliamentary seats are reserved for women in 2026, but is it enough?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":13365,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"blog","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[95],"grantees":[136],"partner":[10,59],"region":[137],"class_list":["post-13364","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-countries","tag-research","grantees-zambia-national-womens-lobby","partner-waeon","partner-zesn","region-zambia"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13364"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13364\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13391,"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13364\/revisions\/13391"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13364"},{"taxonomy":"grantees","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/grantees?post=13364"},{"taxonomy":"partner","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/partner?post=13364"},{"taxonomy":"region","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ahead.africa\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/region?post=13364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}