What female aspirants should do to increase chances of winning in polls

Homa Bay woman representative Gladys Wanga carries a basket given by women colleagues during her endorsement for governor seat at Karabondi in Karachuonyo constituency on December 30, 2021. [James Omoro, Standard]

Every politician embarks on a campaign with the belief that they will win an election. Confidence is a plus in running an electoral campaign, but it is not enough to assure victory especially for women candidates.

Women candidates must draft strong substantive policy proposals, which will clearly demonstrate their credibility/competence for the job and enhance the seriousness of their candidacy.

Unfairly, voters expect much more from female candidates than their male opponents to consider them qualified to vie for various positions and a higher degree of substance in their propositions helps with voters.

All women candidates must remember that they enter the political fray in a context in which they will be fighting gender-based prejudice and they must incorporate messages in their communication strategy, which address these prejudices.

Studies demonstrate that men generally don’t have a problem broadcasting their achievements and framing them as individual driven success while women shy away from talking up their individual achievements and instead ascribe teamwork to their success. In the political arena, this can be a handicap to effective persuasion.

Women candidates must therefore learn to enhance their credibility by boldly talking up relevant achievements within the context of their experiences, knowledge or associations.

That could involve debating opponents at times even on live TV. Former presidential aspirant Martha Karua or gender activist Daisy Amdany’s debate presentations contain some good aspects for television debating.

There are various studies in the field of human communication and politics that show that the voice pitch “loudness” or “lowness” of a voice influences perceptions of the speaker. Some of the studies found that audiences associated competence, leadership ability and intelligence with low voices and ascribed attributes such as fear, panic, stress to shrill, high-pitched voices, aspects that do not give advantage on the campaign trail.

One of the women in political leadership who used the services of a voice coach to transform her initially light timbre to a lower authoritative tone was Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. 

Also, great politicians have learnt to use stories to create human connections. Stories are as old as human existence and we originally communicated with each other through stories even before we could write and read. Hence storytelling is hardwired into all of us, because this is how we see, interpret and explain the world.

Lastly, but not least, every woman candidate must learn to use traditional and new media platforms to broadcast their policies to voters. A female candidate ought to develop a sound media buying and strategic engagement plan.

The electoral cycle of 2022 is very different from what we have experienced before; the modern media cacophony heralds a promise and a challenge. Candidates now have multiple channels to pass their messages and media like social media have effectively cut out the gatekeepers in traditional media and allows candidates to directly get to citizens, the only challenge will be contextualisation of content to various audiences and managing opponent propaganda while also creating a real-time credible system for receiving feedback.