On Dec. 12, women broke new ground in ultra-conservative Saudi Arabia, as they voted and ran for office in an election for the first time in the nation’s history.
According to information released by the Saudi Arabian Election Commission, 979 female candidates competed against 6,000 male hopefuls for 2,100 seats on 284 municipal councils. An additional 1,050 council seats were appointed by the municipal affairs ministry. Among a population of about 21 million, only 1.5 million Saudi Arabians aged 18 and over, including 130,673 women, registered to vote.
An Associated Press dispatch on Tuesday last week said that 20 female candidates were elected across the nation, including four from Riyadh and two from the Eastern Province, where the Shiite minority is concentrated. In Mecca, the birth place of the Prophet Mohammed, male candidates and a woman named Salma bint Hazab al-Otaibi won over two other female candidates.
Oil-rich Saudi Arabia seems developed and boasts modern highways, skyscrapers and shopping malls that sell brands from all over the world, but the nation is still an outlier regarding women’s rights — even among the the Gulf nations, where tradition plays a dominant role in society.
A Taiwanese woman such as me, who lived briefly in Saudi Arabia’s neighbor Bahrain as a diplomat’s wife and had the opportunity to travel around the region, could not fail to notice the severe restrictions imposed on women in public, the subordination of women to men and gender segregation in Saudi Arabia. Even now, women cannot not drive cars, must cover themselves in public and must have a male guardian’s consent over issues such as work, marriage, travel and higher education.
Saudi Arabia is an absolute monarchy ruled by the Al Saud family of King Salman — it has no elected legislature. The municipal councils, the kingdom’s sole elected public chambers, have limited functions and powers; they advise municipal authorities on issues such as traffic lights, sidewalks, garbage collection and community facilities. The two previous rounds of council elections, in 2005 and 2011, were open to men only. The opening of the polls to women and the election of female councilors is thus a milestone, albeit a small step in the gradual empowerment of Saudi Arabian women.
Some critics dismiss the election as mere window dressing, saying that not much has changed.
However, it should be pointed out that in the wake of the Arab Spring, not even Saudi Arabia could act as if nothing happened. Late Saudi King Abdullah — King Salman’s predecessor — took the initiative to ease restrictions on women: Four years ago, he announced that women would participate in the election this year.
The kingdom’s 150-member Shura Council, the appointed advisory body to the monarchy, now includes 30 women. Abdullah also opened the nation’s first mixed-gender university. King Salman inherited the changes and held the election as part of the much-touted reforms.
Nonetheless, some hardliners were wary of bold social change, particularly regarding the role of women. A conservative imam cried “man only” in video footage posted online that included warnings that electiona are another step toward Western values. There are lines that cannot be crossed. Gender segregation rules ban men and women from mixing in public and mixed-gender campaigning. Thus, candidates could not directly address voters of the opposite sex and most ran their campaigns online, using social media to get their messages out.
In an effort to be fair to women who wear a full-face veil, the Saudi Election Commission disallowed both male and female candidates from appearing on television, showing their faces in fliers, billboards, or on the Internet. Several female activists were among the dozens of candidates disqualified. Among them were Nassima al-Sadah, a human-rights campaigner, and Loujain al-Hathlool, who was jailed for two months after trying to drive into Saudi Arabia from the United Arab Emirates.
Notwithstanding the limitations, Saudi women took the historic election seriously, as more than 81 percent, or 106,000, of those who registered to vote cast their ballots.
In Jiddah, the nation’s second-largest city, three generations of women from the same family — including a 94-year-old grandmother — voted for the first time. By contrast, men were less enthusiastic and only 45 percent, or 600,000 registered voters went to the polls. Judging from reports in the international media, Saudi women conducted a lively election campaign overall.
Many female candidates, in their effort to garner votes, have called for recycling, opening community centers with daycare facilities for working mothers, public libraries and better urban planning. On the other hand, some focused on larger issues and used their campaigns to promote women’s rights. Sixty-year old Amal Badreldin al-Sawari, a pediatrician in central Riyadh, said she became a candidate out of patriotism and because Islam gives rights to women.
“Men and women have equal rights in many things,” she told a reporter, and quoted a verse from the Koran: “I am not running to win, I have done the winning by running.”
In short, this election is another step, even if a small one, for Saudi women. There are discernible signs that more of them are ready to take the fight for liberation and elevation for the role and rights of Saudi women.
In this context, International Federation of Business and Professional Women (BPW International) is relevant to their cause, as its overarching purpose is to promote gender equality and empowerment of women in the world. This global women’s organization has about 30,000 members in about 100 nations and has held consultative status with the UN since 1947.
In addition to UN advocacy, BPW International focuses on local action as well as networking, mentoring, mutual support, and the development of leadership and professional skills.
BPW International is scheduled to hold its 29th world congress in 2017 in Cairo, Egypt, and its agenda is set to include the gender equality and women’s empowerment in the Arab world. It is imperative for the organizers of the congress to invite Saudi women’s rights advocates and newly elected councilwomen to the gathering, enabling them to interact and learn from proactive female leaders from other nations.
A huge challenge and an important undertaking for Saudi women is to organize and launch a BPW affiliate in their nation to enlighten, educate, recruit and train professional women to promote gender equality and women’s rights. They must learn to support each other, cooperate and coordinate with their sisters at home and abroad in this common endeavor.
Contrary to the wish of Hong Kong authorities, brave and energetic professional women in the territory have recently established a new BPW affiliate, with assistance from BPW International. The successful launch of BPW Hong Kong provides a relevant and valuable example for Saudi women to emulate.
Shirley Chang is an associate professor emeritus and department chairwoman of library and information science at Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania and chair of the Business and Professional Women Taiwan’s international affairs committee.
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