Women and political participation: Reviewing the Yemeni experience [Archives:2002/16/Reportage]

BY KAREN DABRAWSKA
FOR THE YEMEN TIMES
Yemeni women many well be the most liberated, though not the most privileged women in the Arabian Peninsula.
That is the conclusion of Maria Holt who is currently completing a Ph.D. on the impact of violent conflict on women in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and Shia women in Lebanon.
She believes that the lack of democracy is the key to the political development of women in the Arab world. Far from being a homogeneous disempowered group, Arab women are democrats in search of a democratic structure.
Holt described the Republic of Yemen as an interesting case study in female political participation. Before the unification of the country in 1990, it comprised two independent states: the Yemen Arab Republic in the north and the Peoples Democratic Republic of Yemen in the south, and they had very different records where women were concerned.
In south Yemen, the struggle for the liberation of women was firmly embedded in the struggle for national independence. After independence from Britain in 1967, a radical Marxist-socialist regime provided women with rights unprecedented in the Arab world, including the right to participate in the political system and the right to become judges.
In the north on the other hand, although the 1962 revolution provided a new constitution giving equal rights to all citizens, male and female, there has always been a deep rift between what was decided and announced and what was put into reality and practice.
When the two countries united, the laws and customs of the more powerful north tended to dominate. There were no women on the post-unification five-member Presidential Council, and none served in ministerial positions.
However, in the 301-member transitional parliament, there were ten women. Part of the reason for the absence of women in decision-making positions is, first, their relative lack of access to education; and, second, the so-called traditional attitudes of Yemeni society. Female illiteracy in Yemen is over 90 percent. The typical Yemen girl invests most of her strength in daily chores and there remains no time to complete even the most basic level of formal education.
In the first general election held in unified Yemen in April 1993, less than 500,000 between 16 and 20 percent of eligible women registered to vote, as compared to over two million men (87 percent).
Womens participation in the election was heavily influenced by the politico-religious interpretation of the Islamists. Most other political parties did not agree with their interpretation but they failed to take a clear stand and oppose this politicized Islamic interpretation. A total of 50 women, mostly university-educated independents, campaigned for office. The Yemeni Socialist Party (YSP), which had formerly governed southern Yemen, supported a number of women candidates, and, of these, two won seats in the 1993/94 parliament.
Holt concludes that for democracy to flourish in Yemen there needs to be a change of attitudes. The liberation of women, according to one commentator, is a continuing battle to break the strength of age-old traditions, ultimately abolishing the logic of a men-only society. At the same time, although relatively old-fashioned when compared to women in some other parts of the Arab world and constrained by patriarchal social structures Yemeni women play at least a token role in contemporary political and economic life. They many well be the most liberated, though not the most privileged women in the Arabian Peninsula.
For politics to undergo a genuine transformation, both in Britain and the Arab world, a number of steps are necessary. First, through education and the introduction of more realistic role models for boys and girls, societal attitudes must be persuaded to change and to move away from an automatic linkage of men with the public and political sphere and women with the private and domestic sphere. Second, political parties must be encouraged to play a role in putting forward women candidates in winnable seats. Third, womens concerns and policy priorities must be accorded legitimacy.

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