WOMEN AND DEVELOPMENT II:[NAD Regional News] Week May 26-June 1 \Issue F

NAD Regional News

Week May 26-June 1 \ Issue Focus: Gender\Women
a newsletter that covers current Arab issues and press news on development 
and gender. 


CONTINENTS
1- OMAN: revises procedures to make Shura vote fairer
2- KUWAIT: Women score victory in rights battle
3- SAUDI: Women to attend council meet for second time
4- DUBAI: Women hit the road as taxi drivers
5- SUDAN: Hundreds of woman inmates released


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1- OMAN: revises procedures to make Shura vote fairer

Some 175,000 people, 25 percent of Omanis over the age of 21, will be able 
to vote for the new Shura Council.

May 29, 2000  Arabia on Line
MUSCAT (Reuters) - Oman has revised some aspects of the way its 
consultative Shura Council is chosen in a bid to ensure that elections in 
July are fairer than before, officials said on Monday. Some 175,000 people, 
25 percent of Omanis over the age of 21, will be able to vote for the new 
Shura Council, which has only consultative powers and no say in foreign, 
defence and security policy. "The procedures regulating the nomination and 
voting process have been carefully revised to overcome irregularities of 
the past (elections)," the Arabic-language Oman daily quoted Interior 
Minister Ali bin Hamoud bin Ali al-Bousaidi as saying, though he did not 
elaborate. A ministry official told Reuters one of the changes was that 
candidates would register directly with provincial governors, instead of 
with tribal leaders. "In previous elections, candidates were reluctant to 
register their names with the tribal leaders and that limited the voters` 
options," he said. Oman is one of the few stat!
es to hold elections in the conservative Gulf Arab region ruled by 
monarchies. Elders, prominent businessmen and intellectuals from Oman's 59 
provinces have been selected to choose members for the 82-seat assembly, 
which has a three-year term. Sultan Qaboos has the final say in picking 
council members after the vote. The interior ministry official said more 
than 600 nominees had registered for the polls, including about 36 women, 
and final figures would be announced soon. There were 736 nominees at the 
last election, including 27 women. © 2000 Reuters 

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2- KUWAIT: Women score victory in rights battle

An activist won permission to take her fight for the right to vote and 
stand for election to the Constitutional Court. 

May 29, 2000, 01:47 PM
KUWAIT CITY (Reuters) - Kuwaiti women celebrated a victory in their 40-year 
battle for political equality on Monday when an activist won permission to 
take her fight for the right to vote and stand for election to the 
Constitutional Court. "This is a great victory...This is what we wanted," 
said Rola Dashti, who jumped for joy when her lawyer told her that the 
Kuwaiti Administrative Court had accepted her argument. It referred her 
petition to the Constitutional Court to decide on whether election laws, 
which ban female participation, violate the constitution. Individuals 
cannot file a case directly to the Constitutional Court. "All we wanted was 
just one case to make it through and we have that," said lawyer and female 
activist Kawther al-Joua'n. Minutes earlier, she had expressed 
disappointment and vowed to appeal after another court rejected similar 
cases on the grounds of procedural errors. It did not pass judgment on the 
petitions' contents. The legal decisions come one ye!
ar after Kuwait's ruler, Emir Sheikh Jaber al-Ahmad al-Sabah, issued a 
groundbreaking decree granting women the right to vote and stand in 
elections in 2003. But after all-male elections in July, Kuwait's 
parliament rejected the decree in November. Later the same month it 
defeated a similar draft law presented by MPs by just two votes. Kuwait's 
traditionalist tribal politicians and well- organised, influential Sunni 
Muslim political groupings are vociferously against granting women 
political rights. Support from leadership Sheikh Jaber received a 
delegation of Kuwaiti women earlier this month on the anniversary of his 
decree. They thanked him for his reform bid, which at the time triggered 
bitter debate. This month, the country's leaders voiced fresh support for 
women's political rights, although some activists have accused the 
government of failing to back them strongly enough. Dashti said supporters 
of women's rights would present a new draft law to parliament in a fresh 
bid!
 to amend the election laws. "We are working on all fronts, legal 
 October...Presenting the issue in public is now less problematic than a 
year ago when we had nervous responses. Women will eventually get their 
rights and will vote in 2003," said an optimistic Dashti. Kuwaiti women are 
seen as the most liberated in the Gulf Arab region. They head diplomatic 
missions, run businesses, hold senior posts and help steer the OPEC 
member's vital oil sector.  © 2000 Reuters 

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3- SAUDI: Women to attend council meet for second time

The assembly would continue to invite women to attend sessions that 
pertained to women's affairs.

May 29, 2000  Arabia on Line
Riyadh (Reuters) - Saudi Arabian women will attend a session of the Shura 
consultative council on Tuesday for the second time in this conservative 
Muslim kingdom, council officials said on Monday. They said the women, 
including some female members of the Saudi royal family, journalists, 
writers and academics, would be segregated from the men and watch 
proceedings from a balcony overlooking the council chamber. The Saudi-owned 
pan-Arab Al-Hayat daily said 60 women would attend the session, which will 
discuss high marriage costs. Saudi Arabia, which bars women from public 
life, last year allowed women to attend a council session for the first 
time, raising hopes of a possible change in attitudes towards women. But 
the council's head Sheikh Mohammad Ibrahim bin Jubair said later the 
kingdom had no immediate plans to let women serve on the council due to 
religious and social norms. He said the assembly would continue to invite 
women to attend sessions that pertained to women's aff!
airs. It had no plans to discuss allowing women to drive, a key demand by 
some women activists. Women in Saudi Arabia need written permission from a 
male relative to travel. But a growing number work in banks, the public 
sector, education and private companies. © 2000 Reuters 

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4- DUBAI: Women hit the road as taxi drivers

The service answers demand from Gulf women who do not always feel confident 
with male taxi drivers.

May 28, 2000  Arabia on Line
DUBAI (AFP English) - Seven Arab women will blaze a trail in the emirate of 
Dubai from Thursday when they become the first women taxi drivers across 
the Muslim Arab Gulf. They will only take female and children passengers, 
but the press in the liberal trading and tourist hub have greeted the move 
as a breakthrough. In neighbouring Saudi Arabia, which enforces a strict 
interpretation of Islam, women are not allowed to drive at all. "There was 
quite a lot of opposition from my brothers and senior family members," Abla 
Hussein told Sunday's Gulf News. "But I feel that opting for a driver's job 
does not mean that I am going against my traditions," she said. The seven, 
who will wear long skirts and black head scarves in line with local custom, 
will be joined by 23 more women if the project proves a success, according 
to Dubai Transport Corporation. "We have undergone rigorous training for 
three months, including how to deal with passengers and their attitudes," 
Sudanese national Eh!
asan Hassan told the daily. "If we fail there is always the option to quit 
and go back to the sheltered life," she admitted. The new recruits, who 
will not work overnight, will be monitored by a woman police inspector. The 
Transport Corporation said the service answers demand from Gulf women who 
do not always feel confident with male taxi drivers. © 2000 AFP 

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5- SUDAN: Hundreds of woman inmates released

Some 389 women serving terms in provincial prisons have been set free in 
the last few days.

May 31, 2000  Arabia on Line
KHARTOUM (AFP English) - Some 389 women serving terms in provincial prisons 
have been set free in the last few days following a presidential decree 
pardoning women jailed for public order offenses, the Prisons 
Administration said Tuesday. Another 563 woman inmates were released 
earlier this month from the Omdurman women's prison in the Sudanese 
capital. The decree has provided that all women jailed for public order 
offenses, that include liquor trafficking, drinking and misbehaving, be set 
free. The Public Order Law, introduced some five years ago, has been an 
object of bitter criticism by the public, opposition and human rights 
activists. The latest criticism of the Public Order Law came Tuesday from 
the pro-government Bar Association which has demanded its abrogation and 
the dismantling of its enforcement bodies. The Association, which groups 
lawyers loyal to the government, said in a press statement that the special 
policemen charged with enforcing the Law violated human ri!
ghts and personal freedoms by indiscreetly rounding up people for summary 
trial and denying them the right to defence and appeal. The Bar Association 
has called upon the head of state to order the abrogation of the Law, the 
Interior Minister to place its policemen alongside the main police force, 
the Justice Minister to disband the Public Order prosecution offices and 
the Chief Justice to dismantle its special tribunals.© 2000 AFP 


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