Antecedentes

The equal participation of women in decision-making bodies have been ensured by international conventions with commitment from member states to remove barriers that hinder women’s participation and to actively promote and ensure their representation and meaningful participation in all governance structures including the elected and appointed bodies. However, around the world, women continue to be side-lined from decision making processes at local and national level. Globally, the percentage of women in national parliaments is 24.3% and only 20.1% hold ministerial positions[1].

Gender quality is a necessary foundation for achieving an inclusive, equitable and sustained development as development is only effective when the diverse experiences, perspectives and talents of women have been included. Research has further proven that the proportion of women in parliament greatly influences the issues discussed and the legislations prioritised aims to bring positive communities for all groups in society especially children and women[2]. Faced with complex development challenges, legislative bodies with members from diverse backgrounds generally provided more innovative solutions to tackle problems.

Political parties play a key role in determining the political participation and representation of women in the political sphere. The power rests on them for recruitment and selection candidate for parliament and island councils and for women’s involvement within the parties’ hierarchies as well. At present, women tend to be overrepresented at grassroots level but are largely excluded from decision making bodies within the parties which again impacts the issues included in their party manifestos.  Another key factor is the social and cultural norms that continue to restrict women’s meaningful participation in all spheres of public life. This coupled with a lack of inclusive institutions/agencies causes women to face considerable challenges when contesting for elected positions. 

UNDP through its Integrated Governance Programme (IGP) has been working towards creating an enabling environment for inclusive and participatory decision making and partnered with Transparency Maldives to hold a Symposium on Women’s Political Participation in 2019. Among the many recommendations that emerged from the symposium, a consensus was formed on collaborating with political parties to increase women’s meaningful engagement and representation in the political sphere. As such, UNDP in partnership with UN Women is seeking the service of an international consultant to support the strengthening of Women’s Wings of political parties for increased engagement and participation of women.

[1] UN Women and Inter-Parliamentary Union, 2019. “Women in Politics: 2019”.

[2] UNDP and National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, 2012. “Empowering Women for Stronger Political Parties”.

Deberes y responsabilidades

Under the guidance of UNDP and UN Women, the consultant will undertake the following tasks;

In Male’:

• Conduct consultations with the senior leadership and Women’s Wings of political parties (including women involved in the grass roots level) to
  • To assess how members of women wings could be effectively involved in party senior leadership and decision-making process
  • Identify existing barriers for women to contest in elections.
  • Identify training needs and conduct a review of the modules that was designed by UNDP and a scoping on training materials used by different stakeholders 
• Submit an inception report including the work plan, regional and global best practices and recommendations to strengthen women’s participation in political parties.

Home based:

• Based on the findings from the literature review and consultations, revise the current set of modules developed by UNDP to build the capacity of Women’s Wings, develop new modules where necessary, and include a methodology for a pilot mentorship programme for potential female leaders at local levels who will function as lobbying groups for women’s issues at political party and local level.
•  Submit the draft modules including the methodology for pilot mentorship programme for review and incorporate comments.

In Male’:

• Conduct a pilot Training of Trainers (ToT) programme of the modules to the political parties to build a group of trainers (both women and men) within the political parties to train women at the island level and revise the draft modules as needed.

Home Based:

• Submit the final training modules.
• Submit final report which should include a brief roll out plan for the trainings and recommendations based on the ToTs

Expected Outputs and Deliverables

The consultant will be responsible for the following deliverables;

1. Conduct stakeholder consultations to identify training needs, a review of the existing UNDP modules and submit inception report
2. Develop draft modules for TOT for political parties
3. Facilitate pilot ToT for  political parties
4. Submit final training modules
5. Submit final report

The following table shows an indication of the duration for the deliverables;

Institutional Arrangement

The consultant will work under the guidance of UNDP and UN Women and will be accountable to the assigned Programme Officer, IGP, for each deliverable as stipulated in the proposal. Meetings with UNDP senior management will be held as and when needed.

Duration: 29 days between December 2019 – February 2020

Duty Station: Maldives

Competencias

Corporate Competencies

• Demonstrates integrity by modelling the UN’s values and ethical standards and acts in accordance with the Standards of Conduct for international civil servants;
• Advocates and promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of UNDP;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability;
• Treats all people fairly without favouritism.

Functional Competencies

• Knowledge about the UNDP programmes would be an advantage;
• Proven strong analytical abilities;
• Ability to work under pressure with several tasks and various deadlines;
• Ability to actively generate creative, practical approaches and solutions to overcome challenging situations;
• Excellent writing, presentation/public speaking skills;
• A pro-active approach to problem-solving;
• General IT Literacy

Habilidades y experiencia requeridas

Education

• Postgraduate degree in gender, development studies, research, human rights, law or related social science

Experience

• Minimum 5 years of professional experience in the development sector as practitioner or a researcher
• Minimum 4 years of experience in designing and facilitating similar training programmes for political parties
• Experience in the region or similar context is an added asset
• Experience working with UNDP or other UN agencies is an added advantage

Language requirement

• Fluency in written and spoken English is required

Application process

Interested individuals must submit the following as proposals in order to demonstrate their qualifications. 

• A letter indicating why the candidate considers himself/herself suitable for the required consultancy;
• Submission of an updated detailed Personal CV or P11 form which can be downloaded from http://sas.undp.org/documents/p11_personal_history_form.doc
• Lump sum financial quotation, with a breakdown of daily consultancy fee, daily subsistence allowance and ticket fees as applicable – clearly indicate the breakdown of daily fee and number of days of work; 
• At least two references from recent previous jobs or three references contact details

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