It is time for South Africa to have a woman president.

I am saying this although I am aware that, of the three historic liberation movements, namely the ANC, PAC and the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM), only one of these has ever elected a woman as its president.

The Black People's Convention, which subscribed to the black consciousness philosophy as espoused by its ideological theorists, the likes of Steve Biko, Nchaupe Mokoape, Strini Moodley and others, elected comrade Winnie Kgware as president in 1972.

The ANC, which is in its 104th year of existence, is yet to elect a woman as its president, a situation which while in the past was justifiable, especially during the exile period, can now no longer be justified even by the most charitable of its supporters.

As far as the PAC is concerned, it would be asking the unthinkable to expect it to elect a woman as president with its well documented infighting for leadership positions.

I welcome the efforts of the ANC Women's League to once more put this topic of a woman president on the national agenda.

One often gets the feeling that men who proclaim to support women to occupy top positions in political movements tend to behave like white liberals when it comes to black oppression.

Now and in the past, liberals who claimed to support the black cause, never came up with a coherent plan to help remove the cause of black oppression.

The reason for this is not hard to find. All white people, whether liberal or right wing, have benefited materially from black oppression.

This could be the case with women oppression. There are many men who publicly profess to support women to assume top leadership roles but when the opportunity presents itself to demonstrate their conviction, they find the idea most unappealing.

The other problem which complicates this issue is that women, too, seem to lack confidence in electing other women to key and influential positions.

Even where women are in the majority, you will find they elect a man as president or chairperson and elect a woman to the position of secretary or gender officer.

Those who are in the know say the reason women behave this way is because of the PHD (pull her down) syndrome, which sees women preferring to elect a man rather than a woman because apparently, they believe once the woman is at the top, she will develop queen bee tendencies by bossing everybody around her.

Women who aspire to leadership positions cannot afford to give in to such bitchiness.

They have to look at the bigger picture, as it were, and understand that for as long as their male comrades see no material benefits in electing women to top positions, men will not give them their vote.

Women have demonstrated that they can lead. Most have led as chief executives of companies, as founders of profit and non-profit organisations, heads of academic and research institutions, as government ministers, premiers, mayors, etc.

There can be no two-ways about it, those who want to see a woman elected as president in this country, will have to make up their minds that they are going to have to use every dirty trick in the book, just as their male counterparts have done and continue to do, if they are to make their wish a reality. One thing for certain is that male comrades will not hand the position of president over to them on a silver platter.

If you doubt this, just watch how aggressively male comrades have fought to take over control where women have been presidents in political parties such as the Independent Democrats under Patricia de Lille and the National Freedom Party, led by its founder, Zanele ka Magwaza-Msibi.

In short, women have to make up their minds that, if they are to succeed to get a female elected president, they have to be prepared to do anything, including sleeping with the devil himself if need be, in order to get one of their own to become head of state.lBhungani ka Mzolo is a social and media commentator based in Pretoria