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Women in Saudi Arabia 'to vote and run in elections'</font size><font size="4">
Women in Saudi Arabia are to be given the right to vote and run
in municipal elections, the Gulf Kingdom's King Abdullah has ruled</font size></center>
BBC News
September 25, 2011
King Abdullah said women would also have the right to be appointed to the consultative Shura Council.
The news will be welcomed by activists who have long called for greater rights for women in Saudi Arabia.
But the changes will not be implemented until after Thursday's municipal elections, from which women are barred.
Why is King Abdullah willing to let Saudi women vote but not drive cars?
Because the right to vote is meaningless. Elections are mostly symbolic
in Saudi Arabia. Only half of the seats on the municipal councils are up
for election, while the ruling al-Saud family appoints the other half of
the members and the mayors. The councils have little power. The
government reserves the right to postpone elections, as it did in 2009.
There's no guarantee that the 2015 elections, in which women are
supposed to participate, will happen on time, or at all. Moreover, King
Abdullah's announcement doesn't carry the force of law. He could change
his mind at any time. Or, if the 87-year-old king isn't around in 2015, his
successor could easily go back on Abdullah's promise to Saudi women.
Egyptian women, long allowed to vote,
see little progress from revolt
CAIRO — Thousands of Egyptian women fought in the 18-day uprising that
unseated longtime President Hosni Mubarak. They hurled stones at pro-
regime attackers, delivered meals to hungry protesters, and drew global
attention to the struggle through their blogs and Twitter accounts.
At least 15 women died in the uprising, according to official figures. Hundreds
were wounded.
And still, complain prominent Egyptian feminists, women are being sidelined
from post-Mubarak politics: their names ignored for government posts, and
their divorce and custody rights threatened by a powerful new Islamist lobby.
The revolution that ended Mubarak's 30-year dictatorship has done little
beneficial for women's rights in the Arab world's most populous country. With
parliamentary elections just two months away, the outlook for women
candidates is so dismal that Egyptian women activists are shelving dreams of
leadership and progressive new laws because they fear they'll be too busy
guarding their few hard-won gains of recent years.
"We won't waste our time finding women, training women, to run a
campaign. They won't win," said Nehad Abu el Komsan, head of the nonprofit
Egyptian Center for Women's Rights. "We're using these two months just to
strengthen groups that support women's rights."
