Women training

Advancing Women’s Leadership, SDGs and New Urban Agenda Implementation

Bernadia Irawati Tjandradewi at Training on Leadership and Gender Equality for Improved Local Governance.

IT was three days in New Delhi, India – from 4th-6th of May – that was packed with engrossing discussions on how South Asian cities and local governments can work together to achieve a common vision of sustainable urban development. The 4 th South Asian Cities Summit had the theme “New Urban Agenda and Localising SDGs,” and the participants were fully engaged to share the region’s perspectives and initiatives of the organisation.

Women’s Leadership at Local Level Starting off the 4th South Asian Cities Summit, UCLG ASPAC and All India Institute of Local Self-Government (AIILSG), carried out the “Training on Leadership and Gender Equality for Improved Local Governance,” one of the activities of the Standing Committee on Women in Local Governments. Participants were composed of women mayors and deputy mayors, as well as newly elected councilors from South Asian cities from India, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. Mr. Ravikant Joshi, Technical Support Unit Team Leader under the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, led the session on participatory budgeting and shed light on its definition and practice. Participatory budgeting is a “mechanism through which the population decides on or contributes to decisions made on the destination of all or part of the available public resources.” In practice, he shared the positive aspects and challenges of its implementation in Pune, India. Availability and ease of obtaining forms in ward offices and online, being open to all, and regular yearly exercise were some of the good points for the participatory budgeting done in Pune. On the other hand, some critiques include the lack of people’s participation at large (such as public hearings), how it is used as ‘tokenism,’ and the lack of replication to other places.

Another session was led by Dr. Steven Finlay, from the Local Government New Zealand (LGNZ). He emphasised about excellence and performance, and asked vital questions that local government councils need to assess in order to lift their status on these aspects. What does success look like? What support is needed? Data on public perception was among the driving factors for the local councils to improve, as they found out that New Zealanders are not satisfied with the local governments’ performance and seek stronger leadership and better operations than what is currently provided.

Throughout the day, the energy remained high among the participants who expressed their appreciation in learning from other women local leaders and how they gained new ideas and tools to develop, and there was a strong agreement that everyone has a role to play in empowering women and ensuring gender perspectives are mainstreamed at local level. Ms. Rina Shah, a former mayor from Bhavnagar Municipal Corporation of India, explained how women leaders are so capable in governance since they are experts at managing different relationships. She was able to utilise this skill as a mayor,

when faced with a decision on road-widening and saving trees that will be affected, and in the end satisfied the interests of the parties involved.

Secretary General Dr. Tjandradewi reiterated the importance of education, that “no one can take away what is in your head,” therefore it is critical to invest in educating especially women and girls and not limiting them on what they can become. Former Chairperson of the Standing Committee on Women in Local Governments of UCLG ASPAC and former Mayor of Banda Aceh, Ms. Illiza Sa’aduddin Djamal, also highlighted that women’s perspectives are different and tend to be more inclusive and address related issues, thus their voice in local decision-making should be included.

Ways Forward Together with LGNZ, UCLG ASPAC aims to develop an online learning program on women leadership and gender and development (GAD) at local level that can be taken up by more members.