WUNRN
August 12, 2008
YEMEN FEMALE POLITICAL ACTIVISTS
CALL FOR FOR QUOTA SYSTEM
Leaderships of the Women National Committee discussing with
other political activists and journalists during the meeting held at the WNC
center in Sana’a.
A
large group of women reunited on Monday, August 11, around a table at the Women
National Committee (WNC) offices in Sana’a, the technical committee of the
government’s Supreme Council for Women Affairs. Their objectives were to
discuss a common strategy to defend their demand to reserve 15 percent of
Parliament seats for women (“women’s quota”) and to approve a communiqué on the
issue of women’s political participation, to serve as a response to the fatwa
recently issued by the Vice and Virtue Committee (VVC) against the women’s quota,
which they plan to send to all major political figures of the country in the
coming days.
Women members of certain political parties, such as the Joint Meeting Parties
(JMP), the Yemen Socialist Party (YSP) and al-Haqq party, as well as female
representatives from various Ministries (e.g. Ministry of Foreign Affairs and
Ministry of Endowment and Guidance), together with women who work in the media,
discussed the proposed “three political axes” for the WNC’s platform, which
later extended to a further debate. These three points relate to the need to
activate and coordinate support for women’s political participation in the 2009
Parliamentary elections, the need for implementation of the United Nations
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
(CEDAW)—especially Article Four, which recommends temporary affirmative action
for women’s political participation until actual gender equality is
achieved, and the importance of the role of civil society organizations and media
in supporting women’s presence in the political arena.
Hooria Mashoor, deputy chairperson of the WNC, stressed during the meeting that
the “media is not paying enough attention to the quota issue and newspapers,
together with television news channels, should address the issue of the women’s
quota as a major issue that affects all Yemeni women and not one that is
directed to one specific candidate or another.” She also called on all women
politicians to ignore their party affiliations and fight for the implementation
of the quota as individuals.
On July 15, the efforts made by these and other women for the implementation of
the women’s quota were attacked by an non-governmental authority established to
“fight against vice and defend virtue,” (VVC), which issued a fatwa (a legal
pronouncement) against the women’s quota and women’s political participation in
general, which they determined as haram (forbidden), or against Islam.
Immediately, another women’s organization, the Yemen Women Union (YWU),
responded with a note to the Parliament that cited passages from the Qur’an in
order to prove that the fatwa was not in accordance with the principles of
Islam.
The WNC for its part discussed with women hailing from various political
institutions how to best respond to this issue, since “now is the right moment
to do so because the government is currently in the process of amending laws,
which happens every four years, and now is when we need to make the government
include our demand for a quota for women in the upcoming parliamentary
elections,” Mashoor stated. With regard to the fatwa, the WNC raised the
question of whether it was legitimate for the Vice and Virtue Committee to
issue a legal pronouncement of this kind in the first place. In its opinion,
such a decision should be issued by the national religious authority formed by
the ‘ulama, a group of religious leaders and scholars, and not by an
organization that the WNC considers as political and not religious.
Zafraan Ali Almahana, a journalist and activist at Saudi-funded Middle East
Research Center for Human Rights in Sana’a, stressed at the WNC meeting the
necessity to address the lack of information that the religious leaders have
about women’s political participation and its coherence with Islam. The other
members present agreed on the necessity to talk to prominent sheikhs and
religious leaders in order to explain to them what the quota is and why it does
not contradict Islam. They also decided to send a letter to the president, the
speaker of the Parliament, the prime minister, and the official body of the
‘ulama regarding this issue. The correspondence will also deal with women’s
conditions in Yemen with regard to terms of education and participation in the
labor force as well as contain a reminder about Yemen’s commitment to the
CEDAW. The convention was ratified by the former southern People Democratic
Republic of Yemen (PDRY) in 1984 with reservations on arbitration. Given that
the laws from unified Yemen were not amended to conform to the standards of the
CEDAW, this is another demand now made by the WNC.
______________________________________________________________________
----- Original Message -----
From: WUNRN
To: WUNRN ListServe
Sent: Friday, November 23, 2007 5:19 PM
Subject: Yemen - Political Representation Quota For Yemen Women -
Presentation
WUNRN
|
30/10/2007 |
|
Sana'a Newsyemen YEMEN - PRESENTATION
FOR SISTERS ARAB FORUM: PRACTICAL SOLUTIONS
FOR IMPLEMENTING A POLITICAL REPRESENTATION QUOTA FOR WOMEN
IN YEMEN |
Some political parties in Yemen have
shown in previous elections that they will not voluntarily increase women
participation as candidates. Why? Because political parties are dominated by
men and because no one likes to give up power. But also because women in the
parties have not been able to convince the leadership that it is smart or
beneficial to nominate women, or that parties can win with women candidates.
So before talking about a legal regulation, I would like to emphasize that
whether or not a quota is implemented, it remains part of the task of women
within political parties to show their party leadership the importance and
value of having women representing the party as candidates and party leaders.
Including women should not be thought of as a moral imperative. Because the
reality is that political parties just want one thing: to win elections. So
women need to convince the men that it is strategic to include women because
parties can win more votes by doing so.
But without a legal regulation, women participation will increase very, very
slowly in Yemen. It may even decrease. Many women do not have the patience to
wait. They want to see immediate change.
So a quota is a way to do that. –it is a way to jump start that change.
I have always found the discussion about the quota in Yemen to be too general
and too unrealistic.
It is too general because one cannot talk about ‘the quota’ since there are so
many different types of quotas. There are voluntary party quotas, which can be
stipulated in the party’s by-laws and there are legal quotas which are
implemented and regulated by national laws.
When we talk about a legal quota, there is a choice between a quota for seats
and a quota for nominations.
In practical terms, a quota for nominations is the easiest to obtain, because
it requires a small change to the political party law. The law could say, for
example, that 15% of all candidates registered by the parties should be women.
However, the downside of this type of quota is that it does not guarantee that
women candidates will actually win elections. Also, you will still have the
possibility of men running in the same constituencies as independents, who can
be unofficially supported by a party. Another downside is that parties could
nominate women in conservative constituencies where they know they will never
win.
A quota for seats in Yemen guarantees that women will occupy seats in
Parliament, local councils or wherever you want the quota to apply. But a quota
for seats requires a change in the constitution, which would require a
referendum. Organizing a referendum is like organizing elections— it costs a
lot of money and it cannot be organized overnight. If we want a quota to be in
effect for the next elections in 2009, we have to take time constraints into
consideration.
The discussion about the quota in Yemen has been unrealistic, in my opinion,
because the demand has always been 30%. Women organizations have repeatedly
mentioned the Beijing Declaration, which Yemen has signed.
Not that the government should be allowed to ignore international treaties it
has signed, but who really believes one can find 100 women in Yemen who are
willing to run for Parliament. I have personally asked the women in the parties
to give me a list of names, and they could not.
You could say that asking for 30% is simply a bargaining strategy, but
apparently it is the wrong strategy because whenever you send a draft law or
amendment to the Cabinet it does not end up in negotiations about the
percentage—it is just refused.
If we want to succeed in getting a quota, it is very important that we all
agree on the type, and on a realistic percentage. And then we must all keep
repeating that same demand to the government, Parliament, the press,
international organizations and embassies; to whoever wants to hear it and
whoever does not want to hear it.
Of course, in the end of the day, political will is most important. We all know
that.
The president has recently called for a 15% quota of seats in Parliament. That
means 45 seats for women. NDI praises this initiative and is happy to see that
the GPC is taking the lead on this very important issue.
But in order for this great initiative to be implemented before the next
elections we have to be realistic. There is not much time. The next elections,
which are scheduled to take place in April 2009, may seem far away, but considering
the amount of preparation needed, they are not far at all.
We have to see some first steps very soon towards developing the law and
getting it passed by Parliament. And we have be clear that some serious,
realistic deadlines have to be set if we want this law to be in effect for the
next elections.
But the big question is: How can we implement a seats quota in Yemen?
I am not a legal expert, and one of the first steps the GPC needs to take is to
establish a legal committee that will study the practical options for Yemen.
But I would like to discuss here some options for implementing a 15% seats
quota in Yemen’s current electoral system.
I believe that within the framework of the president’s initiative the most
practical solution would be a similar one to Jordan’s quota system.
Although Jordan’s elections system is not exactly the same as Yemen’s, Jordan
is divided into parliamentary constituencies as well. Jordan had 104
parliamentary seats and has increased this to 110, reserving those 6 extra seats
for women.Those seats are given to the six women with the highest percentage of
votes in the country.
So an option for Yemen is to expand the Parliament with 45 seats. Those seats
will be linked to a constituency and the 45 seats will go to those women with
the highest percentage of votes within their constituency. However, you will
have no guarantee that those 45 seats will be evenly distributed over the
country. You could end up with a situation where one constituency is
represented by 1 male MP and 15 female MP’s, which is likely to happen in Aden,
where most women will run and win high percentages of votes.
You could also not expand the Parliament with 45 seats but simply say that of
all women candidates the 45 women with the highest percentage of votes will
make it to Parliament. However, the problem you will face then is that some
women may win a constituency with only 5% of the votes, while the actual male
winner has 45% of the votes. And this will negatively affect the legitimacy of
those female MP’s.
On the other hand, women candidates might actually get very high percentages of
votes if we can convince parties that it is in their favor to run women
candidates so they will dedicate more energy and resources to encouraging
people to vote for women. Parties will find it advantageous to nominate women
because they will be able to win extra seats when running a woman candidate. If
they then give those women the full support of the party, the women candidates
will probably even win with a high percentage of the votes.
Another option would be a similar one to Morocco: where the 45 reserved extra
seats for women are from a national list. So you then have 301 MP’s who are
linked to a constituency and 45 seats on top of that which are not connected to
any particular geographical constituency.
I understand from some legal experts that article 63 of the constitution needs
to be changed in order to implement the seats quota. Article 63 says:
“The House of Representatives consists of 301 members, who shall be elected in
a secret, free and equal vote directly by the people. (The Republic shall be
divided into constituencies equal in number of population with a variation of
not more than 5% plus or minus. Each constituency shall elect a member to the
House of Representatives.”)
The word ‘equal’ is the problem here, because with a quota a vote for a woman
is worth more than a vote for a man. The word equal should be deleted, and a
clause should be added referring to the minimum of 45 seats reserved for women.
In order to change this article, a referendum must be held nationwide.
So implementing this quota requires a lot of work. Because there is not much
time, we need to have a realistic timeframe addressing the following questions:
By when does the draft law have to be approved by the Cabinet?
By when does it need to be introduced to Parliament?
By when does it have to be passed by Parliament? And in regard to the
referendum: Can SCER really arrange that before the next elections??? Does it
have the organizational capacity? We have to think about these issues
realistically and then follow up on these deadlines with the GPC.
NDI will support this process as much as possible. We can help by bringing
together legal expertise, by assisting the party’s women committees in lobbying
parliament, by helping to organize media awareness campaigns, and of course by
training women candidates.
Finally, when demanding a quota, I would like to hear Yemeni women speak out
more clearly as to why having more women in elected offices is important for
the country. Not only because women are 50% of society, and therefore it should
be a democratic right. It is important because women’s voices will be heard,
because women’s experiences are needed in political life, because women, especially
in Yemen, are the gateway to the votes and to understanding the needs of half
the population, and because women can win those votes.
Using these arguments, rather than using the moral argument — that ‘it is our
right, because we are half of the society,’ will be far more convincing.
Political parties will finally see that it’s actually in their interest to
include women because they will win with women.
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