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Good practice Imported

Guinea's 2019 Law on Parity for Electoral Lists

Guinea · Conakry · See the Guinea profile · See the Conakry profile

Evidence: Observational / pre–post Top 85% 26/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Guinea's 2019 Law on Parity mandated 50% women on all electoral lists, replacing a 30% quota never met in practice. Passed unanimously after women won just 21.9% of seats in 2013, the law itself was never enacted — a case study in policy vs. practice.

21.9 %
Women's seats in Guinea's National Assembly (2013 election) (2013)
14.9 %
Women parliamentarians in Guinea before the 2021 coup (pre-2021)
10 (6 of 29) %
Women ministers in Guinea's current government (current)
30.86 %
Women in Guinea's post-coup National Transitional Council (post-coup)
Guinea's 2019 Law on Parity for Electoral Lists

Details

Promoter
National Assembly of Guinea / UN Women Guinea
Period
2019–present
Keywords
politics, elections, legislation, gender parity, governance

Context

Guinea's 2013 legislative election returned only 25 of 114 National Assembly seats (21.9%) to women, despite a nominal 30% candidate quota that had never been met in practice, even though women made up 51.7% of the population and 50.8% of registered voters.

Objectives

The 2019 Law on Parity aimed to replace the unmet 30% quota with a stricter, alternating 50% requirement for women candidates on every electoral list for national and local elections, making non-compliant lists legally inadmissible.

Activities

Guinea's National Assembly unanimously adopted the Law on Parity on 2 May 2019, with UN Women and UNDP supporting its drafting and advocacy through funding from the Government of Canada.

Results

According to the Institute for Security Studies (ISS Africa), the parity law was never enacted. Women's ministerial representation has since fallen to 10% (6 of 29) under the current government, down from 14.9% of parliamentarians before Guinea's 2021 coup, though women held 30.86% of seats in the temporary post-coup National Transitional Council.

Conclusions

This case illustrates that a well-designed, unanimously-passed parity law does not by itself guarantee representation: implementation stalled amid friction with the pre-existing quota, limited political will, weak enforcement capacity, entrenched patriarchal norms, and a reported 22% female literacy rate.

Implementation
Indicative cost
Medium (€50k–€500k) — National legislative reform supported by UN Women/UNDP drafting and advocacy assistance, funded by the Government of Canada; no large-scale infrastructure spend documented.
Time to results
Long (> 3 years) — Passed unanimously on 2 May 2019; as of the latest reporting under the current government, the law remains unenacted with no set implementation timeline.
Staffing & skills
National Assembly of Guinea, UN Women, UNDP, Government of Canada (funder)

Conditions for success

  • Enforcement mechanisms and penalties for non-compliant lists
  • Alignment between the new parity law and the pre-existing 30% quota
  • Sustained political will
  • Improved female literacy (reported at 22%)

Common failure modes

  • Law never enacted despite unanimous passage
  • Friction with the pre-existing, separately-unmet 30% quota
  • Weak enforcement capacity
  • Entrenched patriarchal norms

Where it fits

Governance type
national legislature
Scale
national

Commonly funded by

National / regional programmes

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Data sources

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