Time for women baddies to be on the ballot

Photo courtesy: Badili Africa and Mzalendo Trust

The announcement of a new women-focused voter registration campaign is timely. Its success will depend on breaking down the barriers that continue to exclude women from their full participation in our democracy.

During the tenth edition of Sauti Sessions Live this week, Linda Mwananchi movement activist Faith Odhiambo announced several women from across the political divide are set to launch “Baddies na Ballots”, a voter registration drive targeting women, and especially young women. The initiative to break the barriers women and youth face in political leadership is apt.

Women’s suffrage has always been tied to the reason to vote. In 1948, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott organised the first American women’s rights convention after they were refused to speak to an anti-slavery conference. Met with derision at the time, it was this moment that ignited the long march to universal suffrage. Driven by concerns about the impact alcohol was having on families, New Zealander Kate Sheppard mobilised 32,000 women to demand the vote in 1893.

It was women-led "bread and peace" protests that helped precipitate Russia's 1917 revolution and women's voting rights. By the time Aba women in Nigeria got to polling booth in 1979, they had been campaigning against oppressive colonial taxation for 50 years. In Kenya, women first exercised their right to vote in 1963 as part of the broader struggle for majority rule, land and freedom. In Kenya, women first exercised their right to vote in 1963 as part of the broader struggle for majority rule, land and freedom.

Tragically, universal suffrage has rarely translated into power parity for all constituencies. Despite anti-colonial mass mobilisation, although trailblazers like Margaret Kenyatta were elected to the Nairobi City Council as Dagoretti Councillor, no woman was elected or nominated to Kenya's first Parliament. Since then, women's voter registration and turnout have never translated into equal representation in governance.

It was this historical injustice that Article 27 and 81 of the Constitution sought to address in 2010. Mandating the State to implement a two-thirds gender principle for elective and appointive governance structures and introduce women empowerment programmes it was argued, would push Kenya closer to gender equality. Sixteen years later, this has still not happened.

Kenya’s progress like many countries across the world has been incremental not transformative. The gender gap is closing very slowly. Kenya ranked 75^th World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap Report 2024. Kenya's progress on economic empowerment contrasts sharply with under performance in education and health access. Despite being roughly 50 per cent of voters, women are underrepresented as County Governors (14.9 per cent), National Assembly (23 per cent), Senate (31.3 per cent) and Cabinet (28 per cent). Only the Judiciary comes closest to gender parity (44 per cent).

Two spirited public interest cases produced important landmark High Court rulings in 2016 and 2026. Both found the Kenyatta and Ruto Cabinets in breach of the constitutional two-thirds gender rule. Whether the 5th complies with the court's 30 October deadline to do so remains uncertain. Compliance will require sustained public pressure. The problem is political power, not our laws.

Women across party lines should remind the National Administration of its June 2022 Women’s Charter commitments. They promised Cabinet gender parity, implementation of the two-thirds gender rule, economic empowerment, anti-GBV measures and menstrual health programmes. Four years on, is it time for a new charter that also confronts femicide, pedicide and technology-facilitated gender violence? To bring more women into politics, the campaign must confront funding gaps, harassment and digital abuse. Women belong on the podiums, not just in the audience. Let’s publicly rebuke male speaker-only rallies or “mallies”.

Finally, the voter registration drive, which launches at the Uwazi Festival in Nakuru on 5 September, must also focus on the quality of women candidates. That only Hon. Veronica Nduati and Hon. Millie Mabona ranked among the top twelve contributors across Senate and Parliament according to Mzalendo Trust, should concern us. The electorate must look for leaders with a proven record of public service and reject candidates, male or female, who lack a clear agenda for women and the nation.

God willing, centenarian author Muthoni Likimani will cast her ballot next year. Let’s honour her and generations of women by ensuring we have millions more ‘baddie” women in the polling booths and on the ballot.

This opinion was also published in the Saturday Standard, 15 August 2026.