gender equality and accept that women not only have the right to be represented in public bodies such as councils and parliament. We therefore make recommendations as follows; 1. At the expiry of S124 of the constitution, which guarantees an additional 60 women members from political parties from the 10 provinces based on proportional representation for two terms, it should be noted that there are still difficulties and resistance to integrating women in mainstream politics. The challenges demonstrate the need for continued existence of quotas to ensure increased women participation. This will ensure continued integration of women in all spheres including at the local government level. 2. However, while the quota system is still important in increasing women participation, legislation including the Electoral Act should be amended in such a way that it is explicit about implementing the spirit of Section 17 of the constitution to the letter. For example, the provision in the legislation should read “Out of the 210 Constituencies set out in the Constitution that will constitute the National Assembly, 105 seats shall be reserved for women”. Whether this is through direct election or through proportional representation will be subject for further debate. Without these explicit provisions, political parties will continue to play lip-service to the issues of women participation. 3. The advantage of the quota system is that it is implementable and enforceable and this can easily cascade down to internal political party processes and make sure they are in compliance with the law before presenting their candidates list for elections.