Making the Zimbabwe Constitution work for its men, women, boys and girls

2.1    Criminalisation of Sexual Harassment

The Commission recommends criminalisation of sexual harassment through the enactment of a Sexual Harassment Act.

2.2    There is need to ensure that the outlawing of Child Marriage is made justifiable through relevant statutes.  Currently, the scourge persists due to insufficient legal deterrents.

2.3    GBV appears to be on the increase.  There is need for Parliament to ensure that national institutions tasked with addressing GBV are adequately resourced.

3. Macro-Economic Framework Should Leave No one Behind

There is need to ensure that Macro-economic policies, including the Transitional Stabilisation Programme are informed by situational and gender analysis.  Social sectors need to be adequately funded and Parliament in its oversight role, should request information on gender budgeting.

4. Integrating Gender into National Response to Pandemics and Natural Disasters

Lessons learnt from Cyclone Idai and Covid-19 pandemic is that national responses should have an in-built mechanism to address gender dimension which deepens prevailing inequalities and derails any gains.  Gender should therefore be one of the key considerations in the national response.

5. Strengthen Institutional Mechanism on Gender Equality

There appears to be a draw back to the rights conferred by the 2013 Constitution to the extent that funding remains critical among the gender machinery.  There is need for the legislature to ensure that institutions responsible for championing gender equality are adequately resourced.  The ZGC budget tracking and monitoring of resources allocated to gender equality across Government ministries has noted very few resources are allocated to gender equality or gender mainstreaming activities across all sectors.

5.1    Resourcing of ZGC

Limited financial and human resources hinder implementation of ZGC’s mandate.  The Gender Commission was allocated only 0.03% of the National Budget in 2019, and 0.04% in 2020 respectively, which is far inadequate for the Commission to effectively implement its constitutional mandate.  There is also need to facilitate decentralisation of the Commission to provincial level beyond the one officer in Bulawayo for which concurrence has been received.

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