History made in Honduras as Xiomara Castro set to become country's first woman president, and other stories

#WomenLead (Issue 78): Your weekly round-up on women in politics

Hello, and welcome to Issue 78! 

It’s been quite a week around the world - two more countries in the world will now be led by women. Magdalena Andersson is back to being Sweden’s PM after all the commotion in recent days, and Honduras will have a woman President for the first time in its history! The world now has 29 women leaders, with Moldova and Barbados being led by both a woman PM and President (#StuffOfDreams). 

This week, we turn the Spotlight on Honduras and bring you updates from Germany, India, Luxembourg and Uzbekistan. In case you missed last week’s edition, you can read it here. 

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Quick Updates

🤮 SEXISM AT THE WORKPLACE: It’s raining sexism and misogyny in Indian politics and leading the trend are none other than - who else - male politicians. Last week, as the winter session of the Parliament began, MP Shashi Tharoor shared a selfie with six women colleagues. He decided to share it on social media with the caption: “Who says the Lok Sabha isn’t an attractive place to work?”

Women; therefore, “attractive”. But wait, it gets worse. When people called him out for this blatant sexism, Tharoor defended himself saying this was all done in “great good humour” and a “show of workplace camaraderie”. #ShamlessnessAlert 

Giving Mr. Tharoor some company in uncouth behaviour was Nitish Kumar, Chief Minister of the state of Bihar. When his fellow legislator Nikki Hembrom raised an issue related to her constituency during a party meeting, Kumar told her, “You are so beautiful. How can you say such things?”

If you have any tips on how to stay calm amid such displays of disgust, please feel free to send them our way. Our blood continues to boil for now.😡