Kota Kinabalu: Sabah has to develop the structures that implement and evaluate policies on women’s involvement in leadership rather than focusing simply on empowering women, said Institute for Development Studies (IDS) Chief Executive Officer Datuk Ts. Dr Ramzah Dambul.
Ramzah said women were already capable of taking on leadership roles, but the present system needed to provide equal opportunities and create a more conducive environment for their involvement.
“We must strengthen the system. We need to empower the system because women are already powerful,” he said during the Leading Sabah Forward: Leadership, Challenges and Impact event at Zara Boutique Hotel, here.
He said an effective system should cover three key components, namely clear standard operating procedures and mechanisms, proper implementation, and effective monitoring.
“As far as women’s advocacy in Sabah is concerned, I think we now just have the SOP and the objectives. However, there isn’t a good environment for both implementation and monitoring,” he said.
Ramzah said having policies and targets was insufficient if they were not properly implemented or monitored to determine whether the desired outcomes were being achieved.
He said independent monitoring was also important as the same agencies responsible for implementing policies should not be left to assess their own performance.
He said the Women Leadership Initiative under IDS could serve as one possible platform for improving independent monitoring and tracking progress in women’s representation in leadership.
Ramzah also said gaps existed in women’s representation at the local authority level, with only a small number reaching the 30pc mark.
He added that this demonstrated the need to look beyond policy formulation and examine how strategies were translated into action at various levels of decision-making.
Meanwhile, Ramzah said IDS had maintained a balanced representation of women in its leadership, with women comprising approximately 45pc of its board and 55pc of its top management decision-makers.
He said the representation was achieved on merit and demonstrated the value of having both men and women involved in decision-making. This is not about women being better than men or men being better than women. It is about the synergy that comes from having a balance,” he said.
Ramzah said his upbringing in a rural area of Ranau had shaped his views of leadership, particularly the importance of providing opportunities for people from underprivileged and marginalised backgrounds.
“The playing field is not levelled, so intervention in terms of helping those who are underprivileged and marginalised must always stay,” he said.
He said leadership should be value-driven and supported by empathy, equal opportunities and a willingness to address systemic weaknesses.
Ramzah said stronger implementation and independent monitoring could help Sabah close the gap between policies and their actual outcomes, but sustained progress would require commitment over the next five to 10 years.
