Among some of the rather peculiar new Cabinet portfolios, one in particular caught my attention. It niggled. It irked me. It quietly insulted me, all the time pretending to be my friend.

It wasn't Trevor Manuel's non-descript 'National Planning Commission'; it wasn't the odd transition from 'Housing' to 'Human Settlement'; and it wasn't even the portfolio of Defence and Military Veterans (although this did elicit a very nervous giggle).

No ? it was something far more seemingly innocuous. Noluthando Mayende-Sibiya has been chosen as the Minister of Women, Youth, Children and People with Disabilities. The fact that you are probably shrugging your shoulders and asking 'so what?' is indicative of just how far South Africa really is from any real kind of gender equity.

Youth. Children. People with Disabilities. Yes, unfortunately, women too fall under the general societal category of 'vulnerable', but to group more than half of the population under a small 'problem issues' ministry is hardly likely to solve that problem. The fact that women, like youth, children and disabled people need to be protected (read: by default, from men) is a poor excuse for grouping all of the above in a single category.

Youth, children and ? as politically incorrect as this may sound ? to a large degree many disabled people, are not afforded the same status as fully grown males. To lump women in this category not only infantilises them, but also suggests that women's issues are some how divorced from the other issues of government. You know: human settlement, basic education, labour, defence and military veterans?

There is no ministry dedicated to the special needs of men because, despite much-bandied-about rhetoric about gender equity, government is still regarded as the male domain.

Sure, five out of nine premiers may now be female, roughly one third of the Cabinet posts may be occupied by females and female representation in Parliament may have shot up from 30 to 45 percent, but what does this actually mean?

Unless the women elected to Parliament are actively working towards changing perceptions of women as second-class or lesser citizens and unless the female parliamentarians are subtlety changing the way in which decisions are made and policies are formed so that they are less male-centric, Parliament may as well be entirely male. Somewhat like Helen Zille's boys' club in the Western Cape.

Regardless of her women's rights credentials (she serves as the co-convener for the South African Progressive Women movement) Mayende-Sibiya will be heading up a ministry which is very unlikely to change the problem-fraught gender landscape of this country.

What issues will the department address that can't be addressed under existing departments? Motherhood? Free sanitary towels? How to appease abusive husbands? How to survive being raped?

In a country which hovers near the top of the global lists for domestic abuse, femicide and rape, I would like to tentatively suggest that, if anyone, it is South African men, not women, who require a dedicated ministry. And not one that is lumped together with hapless children and people with disabilities.

Is Rebekah over-reacting? What do you think about the new ministry? Share your thoughts below...