A campaign to encourage people to vote for a woman in the provincial council elections last week appears to have paid off, the organisers have said.

In total 42 women leapfrogged up the party lists from a position where they could not win a seat into a winning place, the Stem op een Vrouw foundation said. Of them, 41 took a place which had been occupied by a man

The number of women who will serve on the 12 provincial councils has gone up from almost 31% to over 33% – which means 191 of the 570 provincial councillors are female.

There is a similar picture on the 21 water boards, where the percentage of women has risen from 20% to 25%.