Lesotho

In the EISA Election Observer Mission Report (2008, p. 20) the ruling party LCD (Lesotho Congress for Democracy) are said to have a 30 % quota for internal party committees and the party LPC (Lesotho People?s Congress) are said to have a rank order rule that one in every three candidates on party lists must be women.

In 2005, the Lesotho Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal from an aspirant male ward councillor to declare the reservation of one third of the local government seats for women as unconstitutional; he argued that the all-women constituencies violated his constitutional right to contest the elections in a constituency of his choice.

The Court dismissed the appeal and upheld the High Court's ruling. It held that the amendment which provided for a temporary and rotating quota of electoral divisions reserved for women was indeed reasonably justifiable in Lesotho's circumstances. They agreed with what Justice Peete in the High Court described as "an undisputable fact...that women in our society have long stood disadvantaged and marginalised socially, economically and even politically."