KARACHI, Oct 18: Almost 40,000 women councillors of the local bodies all over the country have been trained under a project enabling them to perform their functions efficiently.

This was stated by women councillors while giving details of the two-year Women’s Political Participation Project at a press conference on Saturday. Four women councillors — Musfira Jamal, Rehana Afroze, Tayyaba Atif, and Sabira Shahid, who addressed the conference, said that at present planning was being done to establish a women’s political school.

They said that women were given good representation for the first time under the devolution plan in the local bodies. However, it was observed that nearly 53 per cent of women councillors were not well aware of the new system. To properly groom these women councillor, a capacity building project was designed that was funded by the UNDP under its Gender Equality Umbrella Project and the Norwegian Agency for Development (NORAD), they added.

They said that the project linked women’s political participation with women’s welfare through a gender-sensitive poverty reduction strategy. Under this project, they added, selected councillors were also sent for study tours to Thailand and Philippines, and some other councillors were sent on inter- provincial exposure trips so that they could learn from each other’s experiences.

It was stated that the women councillors were also publishing a newsletter under the project. Some of the women councillors had been selected for case studies so that research could be carried out on them to develop future strategy, they added.