bad_meetz_evil
04-05-2006, 04:34 AM
KUWAIT CITY (AP) -- For the first time in Kuwait's history, women voted and ran in a public election Tuesday. However, light turnout for the municipal by-election showed that persuading women to practice their newly won political rights was a difficult challenge.
"We have to prove we are worth the support we got," said a beaming Amal Hamad, a 40-year-old civil servant who had just cast her ballot for one of the two female candidates. "This is just the beginning."
Female candidate Jinan Boushehri, 32, came in second in the polls with 1,807 votes, state-run television announced late in the evening. Boushehri heads the food-testing section at the municipality. The vacant Municipal Council seat was won by Youssef al-Suweileh won the election with 5,436 votes, according to the initial unofficial results.
The report did not announce turnout. Official results will be made public Wednesday.
The vote to fill one seat in the country's Municipal Council came almost a year after parliament passed a bill enfranchising women and enabling them to stand elections. Tuesday's vote was seen as a preview of how women might fare in next year's parliamentary elections.
Two women and six men contested the seat.
The other female candidate, Khalida al-Kheder, 48, a U.S.-educated physician and a mother of eight, said she was disappointed by the low number of female voters.
Social and religious norms shaped campaigning
Though slow in the morning, female voter turnout picked up a little in the afternoon but was not proportional to the number of women voters in the precinct. which accounted for 58 percent of the some 28,000 male and female registered voters.
Kuwaiti women are educated and have reached high positions in government and the diplomatic corps. But many are not interested in politics and see no need for entering a man's world.
The seat became vacant when the council's speaker, Abdullah al-Mhailbi, was appointed to the Cabinet in February. The council has 16 members -- 10 elected and six appointed by the government.
The two female candidates had to campaign without upsetting social and religious norms that discourage the mixing of the sexes. Seating at campaign tents and dinner buffets had to be segregated. Female campaign workers contacted women, and male helpers contacted men.
Aisha al-Rsheid, a journalist and businesswoman who has already started campaigning for next year's parliamentary election, received threats after visiting traditional men-only evening gatherings where men have campaigned for more than four decades. She was told in an anonymous letter to stop behaving like a man and abandon the race "before it is too late."
Al-Rsheid was unhappy with female turnout as she toured the polling stations Tuesday.
"There is lack of awareness," she lamented. "We have learned that we should concentrate more on that," blaming the state-run media for not doing its part to draw voter interest.
The three polling stations had separate entrances for men and women. A woman could vote without speaking to a man, except for the judge who checked her name on the register and presented her with a ballot. The scene was dominated by color posters of the six male candidates, but none of the women. It would be considered indecent for a woman candidate to advertise her face.
In May 2005, parliament voted to give women political rights despite strong opposition from Islamists and tribal lawmakers, who argued that women should not mix with men in campaigns.
While Shiite Muslim lawmakers see no harm in women participating in politics, hard-line Sunni Muslims, the dominant sect in Kuwait, believe a woman's priority is to take care of her family.
Many women agree.
"I feel that women want the seat so that they can become famous and have their photographs printed in magazines," said a woman draped in black with nothing showing but her spectacled eyes. She voted for a male candidate.
"Voting took less than a minute, but running or getting a seat means a woman is giving up her home and children," said the school teacher, who identified herself as Umm Ahmed.
Civil servant Saud al-Azmi expects that it will take women "500 years" to make it into politics. "Screaming and working with men will diminish her femininity," he said outside one polling station.
Shortly after the law enfranchising women was passed, the government appointed one woman to the Cabinet and two others to the Municipal Council, breaking the monopoly that men have had on political positions.
Longtime female activist Loulua al-Qatami, dressed in a pantsuit, short hair showing, said she was grateful to God that she lived to see women became part of the political scene. She was not disappointed at the low women's turnout at the polls.
"It is normal for the first time around, and the fact that two women contested was a gain and a bold step," said the 75-year-old al-Qatami, who said she was the first Kuwaiti woman to go to Britain to study.
"We have to prove we are worth the support we got," said a beaming Amal Hamad, a 40-year-old civil servant who had just cast her ballot for one of the two female candidates. "This is just the beginning."
Female candidate Jinan Boushehri, 32, came in second in the polls with 1,807 votes, state-run television announced late in the evening. Boushehri heads the food-testing section at the municipality. The vacant Municipal Council seat was won by Youssef al-Suweileh won the election with 5,436 votes, according to the initial unofficial results.
The report did not announce turnout. Official results will be made public Wednesday.
The vote to fill one seat in the country's Municipal Council came almost a year after parliament passed a bill enfranchising women and enabling them to stand elections. Tuesday's vote was seen as a preview of how women might fare in next year's parliamentary elections.
Two women and six men contested the seat.
The other female candidate, Khalida al-Kheder, 48, a U.S.-educated physician and a mother of eight, said she was disappointed by the low number of female voters.
Social and religious norms shaped campaigning
Though slow in the morning, female voter turnout picked up a little in the afternoon but was not proportional to the number of women voters in the precinct. which accounted for 58 percent of the some 28,000 male and female registered voters.
Kuwaiti women are educated and have reached high positions in government and the diplomatic corps. But many are not interested in politics and see no need for entering a man's world.
The seat became vacant when the council's speaker, Abdullah al-Mhailbi, was appointed to the Cabinet in February. The council has 16 members -- 10 elected and six appointed by the government.
The two female candidates had to campaign without upsetting social and religious norms that discourage the mixing of the sexes. Seating at campaign tents and dinner buffets had to be segregated. Female campaign workers contacted women, and male helpers contacted men.
Aisha al-Rsheid, a journalist and businesswoman who has already started campaigning for next year's parliamentary election, received threats after visiting traditional men-only evening gatherings where men have campaigned for more than four decades. She was told in an anonymous letter to stop behaving like a man and abandon the race "before it is too late."
Al-Rsheid was unhappy with female turnout as she toured the polling stations Tuesday.
"There is lack of awareness," she lamented. "We have learned that we should concentrate more on that," blaming the state-run media for not doing its part to draw voter interest.
The three polling stations had separate entrances for men and women. A woman could vote without speaking to a man, except for the judge who checked her name on the register and presented her with a ballot. The scene was dominated by color posters of the six male candidates, but none of the women. It would be considered indecent for a woman candidate to advertise her face.
In May 2005, parliament voted to give women political rights despite strong opposition from Islamists and tribal lawmakers, who argued that women should not mix with men in campaigns.
While Shiite Muslim lawmakers see no harm in women participating in politics, hard-line Sunni Muslims, the dominant sect in Kuwait, believe a woman's priority is to take care of her family.
Many women agree.
"I feel that women want the seat so that they can become famous and have their photographs printed in magazines," said a woman draped in black with nothing showing but her spectacled eyes. She voted for a male candidate.
"Voting took less than a minute, but running or getting a seat means a woman is giving up her home and children," said the school teacher, who identified herself as Umm Ahmed.
Civil servant Saud al-Azmi expects that it will take women "500 years" to make it into politics. "Screaming and working with men will diminish her femininity," he said outside one polling station.
Shortly after the law enfranchising women was passed, the government appointed one woman to the Cabinet and two others to the Municipal Council, breaking the monopoly that men have had on political positions.
Longtime female activist Loulua al-Qatami, dressed in a pantsuit, short hair showing, said she was grateful to God that she lived to see women became part of the political scene. She was not disappointed at the low women's turnout at the polls.
"It is normal for the first time around, and the fact that two women contested was a gain and a bold step," said the 75-year-old al-Qatami, who said she was the first Kuwaiti woman to go to Britain to study.