KUALA LUMPUR: Women must make greater effort to empower themselves with good media and technological knowledge to stand out politically.
Communications and Multimedia Minister Datuk Seri Dr Salleh Said Keruak said women play an important role in nation building but very often they shied away from the media.
"Women should be more motivated to highlight their capabilities and accentuate their professionalism and role in the country's leadership," he said.
He said this was to bridge the gap and the gender equality score when compared with men, especially in public and political roles.
" In terms of gender inequality, we are not far behind developed countries like Australia, America and Luxembourg. According to The Global Gap report on gender inequality published on Nov 2 we are just standing at 0.670, where else Luxembourg and America stood at 0.706 and 0.718 respectively," he said in his speech at the "Women Power Talk: Advancing 'U' Through Media" programme at Putra World Trade Centre (PWTC) today.
Salleh said the index used to measure the inequality was score 1 for equality and 0 for inequality in four main aspects - economic achievement, education, health and political mastery.
"Score indicator 1 as equality and 0 as inequality used in the survey showed that Malaysia's score improved from 0.6550 in 2015 to 0.6658 in 2016, and 0.670 in the year 2017. Our score when compared with other developed countries showed that women's role in political mastery aspect needed improvement.
"Malaysia is far behind in this aspect with a score of 0.058 as compared with Luxembourg (0.184), United States (0.124), and Australia (0.232). If we can tighten or reduce this gap, then the question of gender inequality in Malaysia may not exist," Salleh said. encouraging women to be more bold, loud and technology savvy in politics.
Salleh said the gender Inequality Report had also claimed that the government discriminated women in the country's politics, citing an example of Sarawak state assembly which only had seven women out of a total 71 state assemblymen.
"The government is determined to have at least 30 percent women involvement in all fields soon. However this is only possible with their commitment and effort ," he said.
The "Women Power Talk themed 'Advancing 'U' Through Media' was organised by Wanita Umno's Professional Bureau under Wanita Umno Vice-Chief Datuk Azizah Mohd Dun's supervision/leadership. Also present was president Tan Sri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil.
This was the third year that Wanita Umno organised the Woman Power talk, aimed to empower women and help them break the social barrier and stand tall in their respective industries.