JEDDAH, Sept 25, (Agen-cies): Saudi Arabia’s king announced on Sunday women would be given the right to vote and stand in elections, a bold shift in the ultra-conservative absolute monarchy as pressure for social and democratic reform sweeps the Middle East.
It was by far the biggest change in Saudi Arabia’s tightly-controlled society yet ordered by the 88-year-old Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, who took power six years ago with a reformer’s reputation but has ruled as a cautious conservative.
In practice, the measure will do little to change how the country is run: Saudi Arabia’s rulers allow elections only for half of the seats on municipal councils which have few powers. Only men will vote at the next elections which will take place next week; women will be allowed to vote in 2015.
The king did not address broader issues of women’s rights in a country where women are not allowed to drive and require a male relative’s permission to work or leave the country.
But the announcement was hailed by liberals and activists who said it raised hopes that other demands for greater democratic and social rights might one day be met.
“This is great news,” said Saudi writer and women’s rights activist Wajeha al-Huwaider. “Women’s voices will finally be heard. Now it is time to remove other barriers like not allowing women to drive cars and not being able to function, to live a normal life without male guardians.”
In his five-minute speech, Abdullah said women would be permitted to join the unelected advisory Shura Council, which vets legislation although it has no binding powers.
“Because we refuse to marginalise women in society in all roles that comply with sharia (Islamic law), we have decided, after deliberation with our senior ulema (clerics) and others... to involve women in the Shura Council as members, starting from the next term,” he said.
“Women will be able to run as candidates in the municipal election and will even have a right to vote.”
Washington, Saudi Arabia’s ally, praised the measures, saying they offered women “new ways to participate in the decisions that affect their lives and communities”.
“The announcements made today represent an important step forward in expanding the rights of women in Saudi Arabia,” said a White House statement. “We support King Abdullah and the people of Saudi Arabia as they undertake these and other reforms.”
Robert Lacey, author of two books about the kingdom, described the change as the first positive response to a pent-up demand for reform that has begun to emerge in Saudi Arabia as popular democracy movements spread elsewhere in the Middle East.
During the Arab Spring pro-democracy protests, Saudi activists called for demonstrations, but only tiny numbers of people responded by taking to the streets, apart from members of the Shi’ite minority in the country’s Eastern Province.
Saudi Arabia responded by barring demonstrations and by announcing nearly $130 billion in social spending in March.
“This is the first positive, progressive speech out of the government since the Arab Spring,” said Lacey. “First the warnings, then the payments, now the beginnings of solid reform.”
In a country where even cautious change is bitterly opposed by conservative clerics and some members of the ruling family, women’s rights have drawn scrutiny at home and from abroad.
The king did not address broader issues of women’s social rights, such as the ban on issuing driving licenses to women, which prompted small protests this summer by women who defied the authorities and drove.
Women in Saudi Arabia must also have written approval from a male guardian — a father, husband, brother or son — to leave the country, work or even undergo certain medical operations.
In 2002, the Saudi religious police shocked the nation and the world when they prevented schoolgirls from evacuating a burning building because they were not wearing full Islamic attire. Fifteen died.
Manal al-Sharif, a 32-year-old computer security consultant who was arrested on May 22 and detained for 10 days after posting on YouTube a video of herself driving around the eastern city of Khobar, told AFP the king’s decision as “a historic and courageous one.”
“The king is a reformist,” she said of the monarch, whose country was spared a wave of protests rocking the region by which autocratic regimes in Tunisia and Egypt were toppled.
Saudi Arabia has seen many changes since Abdullah became king in 2005.
Norah al-Fayez, who was named to the post of deputy education minister for women’s education in 2009, was the first woman ever named to a ministerial post in the country.
More than 60 intellectuals and activists had called in May for a boycott of the September ballot because “municipal councils lack the authority to effectively carry out their role” and “half of their members are appointed,” as well as because they exclude women.
The Shura Council had recommended allowing women to vote in the next local polls, officials have said.
In April, Samar Badawi said she was suing the municipal affairs ministry for upholding the ban on women taking part in the local poll.
Badawi filed a lawsuit at the administrative court in Mecca against the ministry for denying women the right to register as voters.
Also in April, a group of women defied the ban on women in elections by turning up at a voter registration office in the Red Sea city of Jeddah, in a rare public demonstration against the male-only electoral system.
But they were turned back by the head of the centre who told them women were still banned from voting.
Sharif was the icon of a campaign through which a group of defiant Saudi women got behind the steering wheels of their cars on June 17 in response to calls for nationwide action against the ban on driving.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has publicly thrown her support behind the campaign, saying that “what these women are doing is brave, and what they are seeking is right.”
“The Saudi woman, will for the first time, become a partner in decision-making. I hope she gets assigned as a minister,” said Sharif.