Liberia - Ejs Center Opens Data Hub for Women in Public Governance

The Ellen Johnson Sirleaf Presidential Center for Women Empowerment has launched a data hub for women's leadership in Public Governance and engagement in policy making.

The hub seeks to empower in-country civil society organizations with current data to advocate for and advance gender equality and enable researchers and the media to monitor and analyze women's participation and representation in public leadership.

It also seeks to equip policymakers, lawmakers, and other government actors with quick insights on how their countries are faring on improving women's representation in public governance and encourage cross-country collaboration for progress; and Inform the public about women's representation and leadership in the public sphere.

"This launch marks the beginning of the EJS Center Data Hub, which is working towards providing data for the entire African continent and aspires to be the premier destination for data on the current state of women's leadership in Africa," said a release from the EJS center.

According to the statement, accessing comprehensive and reliable data on women's public leadership has been challenging which prompted the establishment of the hub with an initial focus on the West African Countries Benin, Burkina Faso, Cabo Verde, Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, The Gambia, and Togo.

"The hub provides data on women's representation in the legislative, executive and judicial branches of their respective countries. It collates data collected by teams of interregional researchers, which is not readily available on any other public databases. The Hub also features detailed insights on the representation of women in cabinets, on high courts, gender quotas and gender-sensitive legislation."

The Center believes that in order to advocate for greater representation of women in decision-making bodies in public governance, the public and CSOs must better understand the current statistics of women that are in leadership roles.

EJS Center's Executive Director, Dr. Ophelia I. Weeks, said: "Only when we know where we stand can we chart a path forward. The EJS Center's Data Hub is the first tool that focuses specifically on the state of women's leadership in Africa and will be invaluable to our work as we champion the rights of women and girls."

Former President of Liberia Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the founder of the EJS Center, added: "Data can be transformative. I sincerely hope the Center's Data Hub will draw people's attention to the low representation of women leaders in public leadership and also empower both men and women globally to take action to ensure equal representation at all levels."

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