Cameroonians, in their usual daily conversations around politics had not failed to mention the specificity of 2013 as the year in which female political representation took a veritable turn for the better and President Paul Biya happily noted that positive development when he mentioned it at the very beginning of his state-of-the-nation address last Tuesday evening.

The presidential outing gives us some useful opportunity to revisit the huge strides made by Cameroonian women in the past few years to bridge the scandalous gap that had been created with years of sidelining or sheer neglect. Government policy has often been blamed for the lag of female representation in the higher rungs of decision-making in the country. But let's face facts! Not as much as any Cameroonian knows of the existence of any laws that inhibit the progress of women either in the civil status or in any other regulatory employment structures. In fact Cameroon can pride itself as being one of the countries whose legislation has never made any clear distinction between males and females either by way of career profile or by emoluments. As a matter of fact, it is even known to have made enormous strides in the fields of social insurance where women are even favoured because of the opportunities given them at periods of pregnancy when they can look after their pregnancy while regularly picking up their pay vouchers even for work which was never done! So women's emancipation should not be looked upon exclusively from the prism of public functions or representative office. These opportunities can also be calculated - as the case has come up rather frequently, especially in the highly-productive sectors of the economy - as a loss in the process of evaluating overall performance of the entity.

This said, political representation for women is also an important issue and the increase in the number of those holding decision-making positions cannot go unnoticed or unappreciated. Cameroon has not been known to be in the upper rungs of African countries promoting women's political emancipation. 2013 brought along good news; The level of representation at the National Assembly rose from 25 in the outgoing House to what can be called in the current situation, to a whopping 56 in the current House . Although at 31.12 percent, it is still far from the target of one-third of the House as desired by the public authorities, it is a considerable leap from the awkward representation of the previous legislative period. The Senate seems to have started on reasonable auspices with a 20 percent female representation ratio. The consciousness engendered by this new political configuration has had effects at the grassroots where female participation in municipal councils and its deliberative and leading organs has also seen an increase in numbers to the extent that the 23 female Mayors holding office before the recent council elections will see their numbers going much higher.

Government obviously has a relay function by accompanying this new posture of the womenfolk by appointing them to other functions such as more Senior Divisional Officers and even Governors because the few appointed so far have not been disappointing in their manner of serving or in expected results. The women seem to be saying that the sky is their limit; on condition that the road to the sky is left free for them to freely use personal merit to get to the sky.

The women have even proven their readiness and their competence in a varied number of areas through affirmative mentoring in a wide range of areas, using the many NGOs within which they work as their best testimony of efficiency.