Data Story: Women in the Western Equatoria State Government

By Justin Anthony

The Revitalised Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan demands that there is 35% women representation in all levels of government. In this short article we look at the statistics of women in ministerial positions, members of state independent commissions and county commissioners in Western Equatoria State.

Out of the seventeen (17) state ministries, only four (04) female ministers were appointed by the various parties to the R-ARCSS in Western Equatoria State.

As per the power-sharing agreement, Western Equatoria State has ten counties in which only two (02) females were appointed as the County commissioners.

No Female advisors have been appointed out of the five.

In the six (06) state independent commissions that brought 30 individuals only nine (09) are females.

Gender	State Ministers	Independent Commissions	County Commissioners
Male	13	24	08
Female	04	09	02
Total	17	30	10
% of Women	23.5%	30%	20%

This brings the total number of female executives in the Western Equatoria State government to 13.

Statistics of women representation in Western Equatoria State  Executive
S/N	Name of candidate	Post	Party
1	Female	Ministry of Animal Resources, Fisheries and Tourism	IG
2	Female	Ministry of Roads and Bridges	IG
3	Female	Ministry of General Education and Instruction	IG
4	Female	Ministry of Gender, Child and Social Welfare	IO
5	Female	Member, Anti-Corruption Commission	IG
6	Female	Member, Employee Justice Chamber	SSOA
7	Female	Member, HIV/AIDS Commission	IG
8	Female	Member, RRC	IO
9	Female	Member, Human Rights Commission	IG
10	Female	Chairperson, Conflict Resolution and Reconciliation Commission	SSOA
11	Female	Member, Conflict Resolution and Reconciliation Commission	IG
12	Female	Commissioner, Mundri West County	SSOA
13	Female	Commissioner, Mundri East County	IG
1	SPLM-IG	8
2	SPLM-IO	2
3	SSOA	3
4	OPP	0

About the Authors:

Justin Anthony, a Data Speaks Fellow at #defyhatenow South Sudan, wrote this data story, which was edited by 211 Check Editor Emmanuel Bida Thomas and approved for publication by Steve Topua, Data Analyst and Trainer. It’s part of the ongoing #defyhatenow South Sudan Data Speaks Fellowship program with funding from the European Union Delegation to South Sudan.

About South Sudan Data Speaks Fellowship: 

This is a three months data journalism fellowship for South Sudanese content creators with an aim of educating participants on the fundamentals of data journalism through in-depth training facilitated by experienced data analysts.

The fellows have been selected from across South Sudan and they are trained in data sourcing/mining, data analysis, and data visualisation for three months (October to December)