Review: “Increasing Women’s Political Participation and Strengthening Good Governance in Indonesia” program funded by the Royal Norwegian Embassy, Jakarta

The Project 

In 2007 The Asia Foundation received support from the Royal Norwegian Embassy to implement the three-year program “Increasing Women’s Political Participation and Strengthening Good Governance in Indonesia”.  The program has two objectives: 1) To reduce barriers to women’s political participation; and 2) To strengthen capacity and skills of women in politics. The program focused on the following four diverse provinces; Jakarta, Aceh, Eats Java and South West Sulawesi.

The Royal Norwegian Embassy in Jakarta commissioned this review as part of the agreement with The Asia Foundation. The program will end in March 31, 2010 with the total funding of $ 1,200,000. (approximately NOK 8, 200,000)

Findings

• The Project has been highly relevant within Indonesia’s political context   The Project largely met its objectives of reducing barriers to women’s political participation and strengthening capacity and skills of women in politics. The project has contributed to increased women political participation and good governance.
• The Project contributed in its first year to the integration of a 30% women quota system, the ‘zipper’ approach, into the Electoral Law, and a 30% women quota system of officials of new political parties into the political party law.
• During the second year of the Programme, a Constitutional Court ruling in December 2008 nullified the zipper system, finding it to be unconstitutional. The Program (both The Asia Foundation and its implementing partners at the national and provincial levels) quickly adjusted their approaches and activities, enabling the Program to maintain its effectiveness.
• The Project established a data base of potential female candidates, supported women candidates to carry out public campaigns and debates and provided entry points for women to exercise and contextualize their rights to political participation .
• At the individual level, improved capacities of women candidates, at the national level and in three provinces (Aceh, South Sulawesi, and East Java) were seen.  The number of women elected in the targeted area, except for Aceh, increased. Such increase has not only occurred in terms of numbers, but also in the compositions across political parties. More parties now have women representations.
• The Asia Foundation and its partner organizations have used a results based approach and the Project has been able to report its progress timely. The Project could have benefited, however, from a more systematic and more participatory M&E system and procedures.
• As a result of the General Election in 2009, the women representation  increased by 7.5 percentage points, from 10.5 % in 2004 to 18 % in 2009 (the parliament and regional councils), the highest level ever achieved in Indonesia.