Saudi Arabia's historic municipal voting sees 19 women elected

[Hard_Rom]

A very very tiny step forward. Control of local budgets not same as control of taxation by any means but better than SFA. The huge turn-out by women may just get some vote greedy male politician throwing Saudi women a proverbial rights bone every now and then. Saudi example of pandering to special interest groups.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/saudi-election-women-win-1.3363216

Saudi Arabia's historic municipal voting sees 19 women elected
Women allowed to vote and run for office for first time in country's history

At least 19 Saudi women have won seats on local municipal councils a day after women voted and ran in elections for the first time in the country's history, according to initial results released to The Associated Press Sunday. The women who won hail from vastly different parts of the country, ranging from Saudi Arabia's largest city to a small village near Islam's holiest sites. Though not many women were expected to win seats, even limited gains are seen as a step forward for women, who had previously been completely shut out of elections.

General Election Commission spokesman Hamad Al-Omar told The AP that out of 130,000 female registered voters, a staggering 106,000 cast ballots, or roughly 82 per cent. More than 1.35 million men had registered to vote, with 44 per cent, or almost 600,000, casting ballots.

Al-Omar said 19 women won seats in 10 regions, with results still to be announced in several more regions.

Around 7,000 candidates, among them 979 women, were competing for 2,100 seats across the country. The councils are the only government body elected by Saudi citizens. The two previous rounds of voting for the councils, in 2005 and 2011, were open to men only.

Many women candidates ran on platforms that promised more nurseries to offer longer daycare hours for working mothers, the creation of youth centres with sports and cultural activities, improved roads, better garbage collection and overall greener cities.

In October, the Saudi Gazette reported that harsh road conditions and long distances to the nearest hospital had forced some women in the village of Madrakah, where one female candidate was elected, to give birth in cars. The local newspaper reported that the closest hospital and the nearest university were in Mecca, prompting some students to forgo attending classes. The article said residents were also frustrated with the lack of parks in the village.

It is precisely these kinds of community issues that female candidates hope to address once elected to the municipal councils. The councils do not have legislative powers, but advise authorities and help oversee local budgets.

In Jiddah, three generations of women from the same family cast ballots for the first time. The oldest woman in the family was 94-year-old Naela Mohammad Nasief. Her daughter, Sahar Hassan Nasief, said the experience marked "the beginning" of greater rights in Saudi Arabia for women, who are not allowed to drive and are governed by laws that give men the ultimate say over aspects of their lives like marriage, travel and higher education.

"I walked in and said 'I've have never seen this before. Only in the movies'," the daughter said, referring to the ballot box. "It was a thrilling experience."

 

[JackLuis]

OMG Creeping equality!

Call me when the mullahs behead a rapist.

 

[The_Trouvere]

OMG Creeping equality!

Call me when the mullahs behead a rapist.

Moslems often punish rape victims more than rapists.

 

[lovecraft68]

Moslems often punish rape victims more than rapists.

Because they're sexist scum.

They probably just elected these women so they can rape them , then stone them to death and throw acid in their faces.

 

[oggbashan]

It is a start, but only a tiny chink of light in the suppression of women in Saudi Arabia.

No woman could stand for election, nor even register to vote, without the consent of the Head of Household, who must be male.

What is encouraging is that so many Heads of Household registered their women to vote, or supported women candidates.

 

[Hard_Rom]

And probably got votes from many men. We are assuming, sometimes, that ALL Saudi men dominate and subject their women to abuse. Quite possible to be religiously conservative and still appreciate a women's touch when it comes to social issues. Kinda sexists but women do have a slightly higher investment in children and education. Especially in 3rd world nations. Seeing as how children no doubtedly come from women.

It's a tiny start but voting rights in the west came about slowly. For us older types, it was only in our grandparent's and parent's time that women, blacks or natives could vote. So we only have less than 100 years on a repressive totalitarian backward ass autocratic monarchy.

 

[phrodeau]

I heard somebody argue that Saudi Arabia is a young country, only 83 years old. The US was a country for over 120 years before women had any rights at all.

 

[oggbashan]

I heard somebody argue that Saudi Arabia is a young country, only 83 years old. The US was a country for over 120 years before women had any rights at all.

My eldest aunt was a Suffragist - NOT a Suffragette. The difference was that Suffragists wanted change by legal means. Some Suffragettes were prepared to use any means including violence.

In Victorian England women were deprived of some rights they had enjoyed for hundreds of years and it took until the later 19th Century to get those rights back. Look at Married Women Property Acts.

Some of my female ancestors were Freemen (an inclusive term), Master Craftsmen and members of Trade Guilds. All three titles meant they could run a business in the City of London and train apprentices.

My eldest aunt, as a property owner, was one of the first group of women who could vote in England.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women's_suffrage_in_the_United_Kingdom

Women's suffrage in the United Kingdom became a national movement in the nineteenth century. Women were not explicitly banned from voting in Great Britain until the 1832 Reform Act and the 1835 Municipal Corporations Act.