Cairo - Egypt's parliament on Sunday approved changes to the
country's electoral law to require 64 seats in the parliament to be
held by women, but women in Cairo said they were divided on the
issue.
The amendments sailed through both houses of parliament over the
weekend, sped by the ruling party's grip on both, but they capped a
long debate that has highlighted divisions within the ruling party,
the Islamist opposition, and Egyptian women themselves.
The new law raises the number of seats in the People's Assembly,
Egypt's lower house of parliament, from 454 to 518, and mandates that
the 64 additional seats be held by women.
The president already appoints 10 seats in the assembly, and has
used some of those appointments to ensure that some women and
Christians are represented.
Safwat El-Sherif, head of the ruling National Democratic Party
(NDP), has described the measures as 'an historic turning point for
Egyptian women and a big boost to political reform efforts.'
Arguing for the amendments on Saturday, Minister of State for
Legal Affairs Moufid Shehab described them as 'positive
discrimination,' and invoked the Convention on the Elimination of All
Forms of Discrimination Against Women to justify them.
According to local press reports, the NDP debated the details of
the plan for weeks before submitting it to parliament for approval,
arguing over the number of seats to be reserved for women, whether
urban areas should reserve more seats for women, among other details.
The amendments will take effect in the 2010 elections, and will
apply for only two five-year election cycles.
'The timing of the amendment is suspicious, coming so soon after
US President Barack Obama's speech and his calls for women's rights,'
Amani Abul-Fadl, the head of the Egyptian Centre for Monitoring
Priorities of Women and a self-described Islamic feminist, told the
German Press Agency dpa.
'I am in favour of women's participation, but in this context, the
amendment looks like a response to Obama's call,' she said. 'Carrying
out Obama's orders is a violation of national sovereignty. It is
unacceptable.'
Out of 444 seats up for grabs in the 2005 elections, only four
went to women. Mubarak appointed another four.
Abul-Fadl blamed women's poor showing in the last elections on
pre-election violence and intimidation, and said the government would
do better to put an end to these problems if it wanted to encourage
women to participate.
'I thought of running in 2005, but then I withdrew my candidacy
because as a respectable woman I could not tolerate violence and
thuggery,' she said.
Huwaida Roman, an assistant professor of political science at Misr
International University, said she supported 'positive discrimination
for women,' but called these amendments 'impractical' and 'cosmetic.'
The seats for women will be allotted by province, based on
population, rather than by the smaller voting-districts.
'If it is hard enough for a man to campaign in a constituency that
includes just one district, it is nearly impossible for a woman to
campaign in a constituency that includes all the districts in the
entire province,' Roman said.
'It sounds civilized to have this number of female legislators,'
Riham Farag, a 37-year-old secretary in a shipping company,
disagreed. 'I think because they will feel challenged they will do
their best to perform better in the assembly and will compete to
offer services to the people who elected them.'
The Muslim Brotherhood, which, though banned, is Egypt's largest
opposition group, reportedly held intense meetings over the 48 hours
before the proposals were submitted to parliament in order to arrive
at a position.
In the end, they decided they would encourage women to run for the
newly-created seats, noting they had run female candidates in the
last election. Brotherhood candidates occupy their seats as
independents.
'Neither the majority nor the opposition deny women the right to
representation in the parliament,' Saad al-Katatni, the head of
Brotherhood's bloc in parliament, said in an interview run on the
group's website.
But, he said, he opposed the law because he suspected it was an
underhanded means of adding NDP seats to the parliament.
'More than 500 women wanted to apply to run in past elections but
were prevented from submitting their papers' because they were
running in districts the NDP wanted to win, he said.
Nagla Mohammed, a 40-year-old homemaker, said she would wait to
pass judgment.
'It is good that women should play a role in politics,' she said.
'But I can only judge the impact of their presence in parliament
after I see their practical contribution. It is not a matter of
having women in parliament - the question is what they will do.'
USA
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