European Women’s Lobby welcomes the election of the first man to Chair the EP’s Women’s Rights Committee

The European Women’s Lobby (EWL), the largest association of women rights organisations in the European Union, welcomed the election of Swedish MEP Mikael Gustafsson to the Chair of the Women’s Rights and Gender Equality (FEMM) Committee of the European Parliament.

Mr. Gustafsson takes over from Ms. Eva-Britt Svensson, with whom he ran for election in 2009 on a shared platform calling for a strengthened gender equality perspective in European politics and decision-making. Eva-Britt Svensson resigned from the European Parliament in September 2011 due to health reasons. Mikael Gustafsson was her alternate on the 2009 electoral lists.

According to Cécile Gréboval, Secretary General of the EWL: "For us, the priority is for the elected Chair, whether woman or man, to show strong and progressive leadership to bring about concrete advances for women’s rights and gender equality in Europe. It is on this criteria that we will be judging Mr. Gustafsson’s performance over the coming months, and we trust that he will live up to these expectations. With this in mind, we also count on Mr. Gustafsson to play an active role in advocating gender balance in decision-making within the Parliament, including in view of the mid-term elections in January 2012 and EP elections in 2014."