Women in Kuwait: Free at Last?

(various papers)

A Step Towards Democracy in the Middle East

By Frida Ghitis

When I first heard the news, I thought someone made a mistake. Did Kuwait's parliament, on a day when almost no one expected it, really grant women the right to vote? Could it be true?

Oh, yes, it is true. But the political confrontation is not over.

The ammunition to stop women's rights was written into the law that grants them political freedom. And the next battles will be watched closely throughout an anxious Middle East.

Since it happened on May 16 -- a date democracy advocates say will live on in the country's history -- I've been talking to Kuwait's indefatigable women's rights activists. The Gulf's passionate suffragettes sound like they're walking on air. If you could radiate joy over the phone, if you could send a smile over an old-fashioned landline, we might all get a true sense of what this means to the women of the tiny Gulf emirate, who have spent more than 40 years pushing this political rock up the steep hills of their male dominated world. For now, at least, their voices beam with excitement.

And yet, you can already feel them bracing for what comes next. We have so much to do now, is what they all tell me. There's no time to rest. My friend Lulwa al-Mullah, the secretary general of the Women's Cultural and Social Society, said the activists are rushing to produce information about democracy for the until-now excluded female half of the country.

''Women have to learn about the law,'' she said, ''How to use it. How to be more active.'' Kuwaiti women already held influential positions. The country is no Saudi Arabia. But men had locked them out of the political process. Some analysts predict female voters in traditional families will simply follow the dictates of their husbands, strengthening the hand of Islamists. But al-Mullah disagrees. Women, she says, will prove themselves. Another brilliant activist, Massouma al-Mubarak, also dismisses claims that this is ultimately a victory for Islamists. It's a victory for Kuwait she said. And for democracy.

Strangely enough, the news that democracy took a giant step in Kuwait did not strike the West with the same impact of other democratic stirrings, such as recent events in Lebanon or Egypt. But Kuwait's parliament has shaken up the Gulf's political structures to their foundation, and we would do well to keep a close eye on what happens next. Kuwait's is no Jeffersonian democracy, but the Parliament more than doubled the number of voters from one day to the next. Nobody knows exactly where this will lead. And more than a few powerful men are unhappy with the decision.

The tiny Emirate, rescued by an America-led coalition from Saddam Hussein's grip in 1991, stands wedged between a changing Iraq and a militantly Wahhabi Saudi Arabia; between forces battling to determine if the future brings political freedom or theocratic oppression to the Arab world. This is the very conflict that the American government now views as key to stability not just in the Middle East, but in the entire world.

The way the winds blow in Kuwait will tell us much about where the entire region will ultimately move.

Women suffer the greatest indignities in undemocratic societies, that's why this campaign is waged with such passion. But the men who fought to defeat women's rights are also devoted to their cause. When Kuwait's prime minister unexpectedly brought the measure to a vote in parliament, the Islamists, who claim women's political participation goes against the dictates of their religion, suffered a punishing defeat. They went down fighting.

But before falling, they scored a potentially dangerous blow. And there is every reason to believe they will stand up and keep fighting. Anti-women legislators managed to add a clause to the new law requiring that women abide by Sharia, Islamic law, when practicing their new rights.

No one is quite sure what that will mean.

The euphoric celebrations that followed the unexpected victory for Kuwait's women are beginning to wind down.

The vote came too late to allow participation in the June 2 municipal elections. But the activists who made this milestone possible say they're already launching their campaigns to elect and be elected to the next parliament in 2007.

The question remains, what will the opposition do to stop them?

Frida Ghitis, an international television journalist for 20 years, writes about world affairs.

Original Articles here and here