VARIA RANAH 2023 Empowering Women Leadership In Malaysia MADANI Way: Government Sector Figure 4: Total Employment and Employment-To-Population Ratio, South-East Asia Source: International Labour Organisation (ILO) Report (2022) The report also indicated that initial job losses in 2020 were worse for women than men, and they were also lagging behind men in terms of job loss recovery in 2022. Meanwhile, women’s employment losses were high among five of ten sectors that experienced the sharpest job losses, including private households with employed persons, arts, entertainment, recreation, and other service activities; accommodations and food service activities; education, and financial activities (ILO Reports, 2022). These sectors were female-prominent. Furthermore, while countries are struggling to recover COVID-19 pandemic losses, the emerging geopolitical tensions between Russia and Ukraine, the Sudan conflict, and the rising inflation rate have caused labour markets to face enormous challenges. As the gender parity gap has deteriorated sharply, the possibility of narrowing it down has become far more distant. However, despite the fact that women’s employment remains low, the Malaysia MADANI concept under the Unity Government was proudly inspired by the contributions of women in the country, to the extent that the 10th Prime Minister of Malaysia has paid tribute publicly to his wife, YBhg. Datin Seri Dr. Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, who played a big role in the success of the 15th General Election. B. The Regional Performance of Gender Parity Gap The Global Gender Gap Index benchmarks the current state and evolution of gender gap parity across four key dimensions (sub-indexes) including Economic Participation and Opportunity, Educational Attainment, Health and Survival and Political Empowerment (World Economic Forum, 2022). However, this study will focus only on two of its sub-indexes, the Economic Participation and Opportunity and Political Empowerment due to its priority towards the objectives of the study. In the Global Gender Gap Index 2022, the global gender gap has been closed by 68.1% which will take 132 years to reach full parity. Among the eight regions, East Asia and the Pacific region has been closed by 69% compared to the overall gap, which will take 168 years to reach full parity. It is shown in the Table 5: Regional Performance 2022, by sub-indexes. Brunei Darussalam, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, and fourteen (14) other countries are listed in this region. However, there are differences in countries’ progress within the region. The Global Gender Gap Index 2022 reported that Malaysia ranked 14 in the region, while the global ranking was 103 with a score of 0.681. 117
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTc1NDAy