Despite particular processes aimed at ensuring gender equality witnessed in Moldova, the country has stagnated during the past ten years, Alina Andronache, specialist in advocacy and communication at the Partnership for Development Center, stated in public hearings on the issue. According to her, practically all the legislative amendments were promoted without achieving the wanted impact and the authorities do not cooperate between them, IPN reports.
Alina Andronache said the Partnership for Development Center’s Gender Equality Index that will be launched on March 8 shows that particular progress was made at political level owing to the amendment of the electoral legislation. Headway was made as regards the perception of the role of women and men in society and politics. But regression is witnessed in the education system and on the labor market, where the greatest pay gap in the last 16 years was recorded.
Central Election Commission president Dorin Cimil said 42% of the candidates who ran in the national constituency in the parliamentary elections of last February were women. In the 51 single-member constituencies, the female candidates represented 21%. In the local general elections, 44% of the candidates were women.
Minister of Health, Labor and Social Protection Viorica Dumbrăveanu said the Ministry is implementing the strategy for ensuring gender equality. The law on harassment at the workplace is being drafted. There were eliminated the Labor Code bans that prevented women with children younger than three and pregnant women from working at night, during nonworking days or overtime. The concept of equal pay for equal work remains a challenge in virtue of the principles regulated by the salary law.
Ian Feldman, chairman of the Council on the Prevention and Elimination of Discrimination and Ensuring Equality, noted that the legislation, including the Labor Code, offers supra-protective guarantees to women. The woman cannot be fired if she looks after a child younger than four. But the men in similar conditions do not enjoy such a guarantee. The employment announcements discriminate on grounds of gender. The authorities should ratify the Istanbul Convention so as to ensure a legal framework for combating domestic violence.
Audiovisual Coordination Council member Lia Guțu said that 13 broadcasters were monitored in the previous election campaigns to see how they respect the gender principle. Most of the channels didn’t ensure a balance. The representation quota in news items was 80%:20% to the detriment of women.
The Parliament’s commission on human rights and interethnic relations will synthetize the information and will submit recommendations to the Government and responsible institutions.
