Blog by Gail Dekreon, SI San Francisco (SIA) Delegate Women For Water Partnership
Event: Enhancing access to Justice: Scaling Judicial Leadership
Organiser: Egypt, UN Women
Date: March 9, 2026
Location: Conference Room 2, Conference Building
A panel of Judges and representatives from Egypt, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Rwanda, Tanzania, Indonesia, Hungary, Jordan, and Portugal spoke on their country’s respective work to improve judicial access for women and girls.
These countries all have Constitutional provisions declaring the right of all people to justice and laws to enforce such rights, but these provisions must be actively promoted and initiated. This is accomplished by time and consistency to educate the public, particularly women, encourage women to seek leadership positions and provide access to such positions followed by access to the judicial systems.
The good news is that the majority of these countries are slowly attaining these changes. Egypt has increased the number of women judges by 16 per cent since 2007, from 30 to 186; AND in 2025 165 women were appointed as assistant prosecutors. Access to justice is not limited to women on the bench, it also requires the ability to get law enforcement to take complaints, for rural women to be able to get to a courtroom, for women to pay court fees to access the courts (or have them waived).
This requires change in the usual way judicial business is done. The framework needs to be modernized, for example by establishing digital platforms for access to judges and courts, especially for rural women and people with disabilities.
Many of the panelists shared encouraging news: Portugal’s dictatorship ended in 1974 and ended the disenfranchisement of women socially and legally. Now 2/3 of Portugal’s judges are women and they hold a large share of positions as prosecutors and on higher court seats. Rwanda’s aftermath of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi population resulted in women taking control of the society. Currently 55 per cent of their judiciary are women, 57 per cent are Supreme court judges and 47 per cent are in the higher courts.
The ”take away”: An inclusive institution strengthens the judicial system. Justice is a Right, not a favor, and is the backbone of peaceful and stable countries. To attain this we need bold transformative legal reform. Justice must become a whole for the good financed by government, it must be independent, it must include training of first responders and prosecutors, it must deliver accountability and it must expand access to include digital platforms.
