Women of Kuwait - Keep Fighting!
May. 3rd, 2005 04:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
semiotic_pirateWomen who can't vote, can't hold public office, etc... When am I?
Note: Not posting this to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
feminist because of the flack I got about posting the results for the vote on Monday... (I called the previous gov't heads foolish for not putting humanitarian concessions on the table before we rescued their asses from the Iraqi invasion back in 1990. Yes, Virginia, it was all about the oil.)
May 3, 2005
Measure to Expand Political Rights for Kuwaiti Women Fails
By HASSAN M. FATTAH
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, May 3 - Kuwait's Parliament effectively killed a measure today that would have allowed women to participate in municipal elections for the first time this year, delaying any further discussion of the measure until after the elections are called. The measure's failure ends any chance that women will be able to vote or run in elections for another four years.
The legislation initially passed through Kuwait's 64-member National Assembly on April 19, but in accordance with Kuwaiti law faced a second vote for ratification on Monday. But Parliament ended in deadlock on Monday when 29 lawmakers abstained while 29 voted for it, leaving the legislation shy of the required 33-vote margin. Attempts to resume voting on the measure today failed when opponents argued that any new vote would be deemed unconstitutional, prompting Parliament to table the issue for another two weeks, after council elections are decreed.
"The government appears to have lost its allies in this and the only thing that remained was personal interests," said Lulwa al Mulla, a women's rights leader and secretary general of the Kuwait Women's Cultural and Social Society.
In the past, the prime minister, Sheik Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, who is a member of the ruling Sabah family, has promised to push through full political rights for women during the current parliamentary term, which ends in June, promising to appoint a female cabinet minister once they get suffrage.
But women's participation in politics has been a divisive issue in Kuwait for years, and in recent months has grown heated as advocates, with international backing, appeared to make strides.
Kuwait's elected Parliament holds most of the reins of power in government. Allowing women to vote would essentially double the country's voting base and redraw its political map in the process. Conservative and tribally backed legislators say that both Islam and Kuwaiti custom bar women from having that much power.
"The parliaments of most other Muslim countries don't have as much power as we do," said Waleed al-Tabtabae, head of Parliament's human rights committee and a fervent opponent of the measure. "We have no problem with women voting, but we do have a problem with women standing for elections. Islam dictates that the head of the nation must be a man, and we are technically the head of the nation here."
Mr. Tabtabae said the effort to get women onto city councils was a preamble to getting women into Parliament, and was therefore illegitimate. "This is a game by the government," he said. "There are many other Kuwaitis who have no right to stand in elections - police, army and others. What makes women so much more special than them?"
Despite the restrictions, numerous Kuwaiti women hold high posts within the government. In making their case for equal political rights for women, advocates also note that the women took part in the resistance when Iraq invaded in 1990, and that they played a crucial role in the reconstruction.
At Kuwaiti meeting halls, or diwaniyas, the issue of women's suffrage, along with a measure to raise Kuwaiti salaries and abolish electricity bills, was the main topics of discussion this weekend. Some politicians sold the two measures as a quid pro quo in an effort to get support.
Activists claim that opponents are simply self-serving. For many lawmakers, the difference between winning and losing can come down to a few votes, according to Khalid al Hilal, head of the National Democratic Alliance, and women threaten to upset the delicate balance harnessed by many politicians. "We are all men and we know how to deal with each other, but the women are an unknown quantity," Mr. Hilal says. "This is ultimately a battle of excuses, not of convictions."
Kuwait's women's movement has grown far more influential in recent years.
In the 1980's, Ms. Mulla's fight to gain suffrage resulted in a number of women parking outside meeting halls where candidates were giving stump speeches, in an effort to remind the men that they exist. .
Despite the latest setback for her cause, Mrs. Mulla says the fight is far from over. "We will continue our pressure and our program. It's all we can do," she said. "But the sense of tragedy will not be lost on us."
Note: Not posting this to
feminist because of the flack I got about posting the results for the vote on Monday... (I called the previous gov't heads foolish for not putting humanitarian concessions on the table before we rescued their asses from the Iraqi invasion back in 1990. Yes, Virginia, it was all about the oil.)May 3, 2005
Measure to Expand Political Rights for Kuwaiti Women Fails
By HASSAN M. FATTAH
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, May 3 - Kuwait's Parliament effectively killed a measure today that would have allowed women to participate in municipal elections for the first time this year, delaying any further discussion of the measure until after the elections are called. The measure's failure ends any chance that women will be able to vote or run in elections for another four years.
The legislation initially passed through Kuwait's 64-member National Assembly on April 19, but in accordance with Kuwaiti law faced a second vote for ratification on Monday. But Parliament ended in deadlock on Monday when 29 lawmakers abstained while 29 voted for it, leaving the legislation shy of the required 33-vote margin. Attempts to resume voting on the measure today failed when opponents argued that any new vote would be deemed unconstitutional, prompting Parliament to table the issue for another two weeks, after council elections are decreed.
"The government appears to have lost its allies in this and the only thing that remained was personal interests," said Lulwa al Mulla, a women's rights leader and secretary general of the Kuwait Women's Cultural and Social Society.
In the past, the prime minister, Sheik Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, who is a member of the ruling Sabah family, has promised to push through full political rights for women during the current parliamentary term, which ends in June, promising to appoint a female cabinet minister once they get suffrage.
But women's participation in politics has been a divisive issue in Kuwait for years, and in recent months has grown heated as advocates, with international backing, appeared to make strides.
Kuwait's elected Parliament holds most of the reins of power in government. Allowing women to vote would essentially double the country's voting base and redraw its political map in the process. Conservative and tribally backed legislators say that both Islam and Kuwaiti custom bar women from having that much power.
"The parliaments of most other Muslim countries don't have as much power as we do," said Waleed al-Tabtabae, head of Parliament's human rights committee and a fervent opponent of the measure. "We have no problem with women voting, but we do have a problem with women standing for elections. Islam dictates that the head of the nation must be a man, and we are technically the head of the nation here."
Mr. Tabtabae said the effort to get women onto city councils was a preamble to getting women into Parliament, and was therefore illegitimate. "This is a game by the government," he said. "There are many other Kuwaitis who have no right to stand in elections - police, army and others. What makes women so much more special than them?"
Despite the restrictions, numerous Kuwaiti women hold high posts within the government. In making their case for equal political rights for women, advocates also note that the women took part in the resistance when Iraq invaded in 1990, and that they played a crucial role in the reconstruction.
At Kuwaiti meeting halls, or diwaniyas, the issue of women's suffrage, along with a measure to raise Kuwaiti salaries and abolish electricity bills, was the main topics of discussion this weekend. Some politicians sold the two measures as a quid pro quo in an effort to get support.
Activists claim that opponents are simply self-serving. For many lawmakers, the difference between winning and losing can come down to a few votes, according to Khalid al Hilal, head of the National Democratic Alliance, and women threaten to upset the delicate balance harnessed by many politicians. "We are all men and we know how to deal with each other, but the women are an unknown quantity," Mr. Hilal says. "This is ultimately a battle of excuses, not of convictions."
Kuwait's women's movement has grown far more influential in recent years.
In the 1980's, Ms. Mulla's fight to gain suffrage resulted in a number of women parking outside meeting halls where candidates were giving stump speeches, in an effort to remind the men that they exist. .
Despite the latest setback for her cause, Mrs. Mulla says the fight is far from over. "We will continue our pressure and our program. It's all we can do," she said. "But the sense of tragedy will not be lost on us."
