Woman elected in Saudi poll for first time

“I did my best, and I did everything by myself”, said the 57-year-old management consultant, running in the Diriyah area on the edge of Riyadh.

“We have 23 female candidates and 153 female voters”, the head of the women’s section said.

In Jiddah, three generations of women from the same family cast ballots for the first time. “As long as she has her own place and there is no mixing with men, what prevents her from voting?”

“We have opened a press centre to update the media on any developments and on the figures and results as they become available”, he said.

The election, which follows men-only polls in 2005 and 2011, is for two thirds of seats on councils that previously had only advisory powers, but will now have a limited decision making role in local government.

The rights watchdog said the distance to voter registration centers and required ID cards that many women do not have hindered the process.

For Saudi women, the election of a woman to public office is “a historical achievement”, even though women accounted for fewer than 10 percent of all registered voters.

At least seven women emerged victorious from a field of candidates vastly outnumbered by men in a male-dominated society.

In announcing the reforms, King Abdullah said women in Saudi Arabia “have demonstrated positions that expressed correct opinions and advice”.

One of the female voters told Al Jazeera, “I exercised my electoral right”.

She said she became a candidate out of patriotism and because Islam gives women rights. “Only in the movies”, the daughter said, referring to the ballot box.

According to election commission data, almost 1.5 million people aged 18 and over were registered for the polls. “Around 130,000 were female, which was around 24% of the total”.

In a kingdom of Islamic patriarchy, where women are still prohibited from driving and punished if they are caught, the latest move was widely seen as a significant development.

The elections come at a time of great social change in Saudi Arabia, a close ally of the United States.

“We are mothers, teachers, doctors”. Women were also segregated during voting.

Today, the government announced that several of the 979 women who ran had been elected to the council.

An appeals committee reversed her disqualification just two days before the end of campaigning, Hathloul said on Twitter.