In the last decade, women’s rights, gender equality and women’s involvement in different issues are getting discussed at various levels. As we become closer to Europe these statements become more frequent.
It is true women’s rights and gender equality are far from the proper level, but not all women are concerned about that fact. Armenian women, being faithful to their promise of obedience to God, tolerate everything with humbly patience. In this situation blaming only men is not so just. To get acquainted with the reality let us try to understand women wish to get involved in local self-government bodies of Armavir marz.
Armavir marz consists of 98 urban and rural communities where 255,8 thousand people live in accordance with the state data. Women outnumber men by 11 thousand in the marz. 52.4 percent of the economically active 203.1 thousand citizens are women. Their quantitative prevalence does not mean that it can be directly proportional to the employment of women. So in Armavir marz only 18.9 thousand out of economically active 106.4 thousand women have jobs, i.e. 17.7 per cent and 23.9 per cent for men.
Logical question arises why women are not involved in local government. Until the previous 2012 local government elections there were 12 female councilors and 3 female community governors in the marz.
In the result of 2012 local government elections only 2 out of 98 community governors and 26 out of 737 councilors are women in Armavir marz. Women are involved in local self governance by 2 and 3 percent accordingly.
In order to complete the picture let’s state that 2 out of 3 female candidates were elected as community governors and 26 female candidates of local self governance bodies were elected by 100 percent.
Those numbers show that the society trusts women, at least for their participation in community governance. But why women do not trust their capacities is another issue.