Saudi Women Win Seats In Historic Election

About 130,000 women registered to vote in Saturday’s poll, Saudi officials said, one-tenth the number of registered men.

“We need more than nine”, said Aljazi al-Hossaini, who was defeated in Diriyah on the edge of Riyadh, where three women won seats, according to Saudi news channel Al-Ekhbaria.

A female voter, Najla Harir, said: “I exercised my electoral right”.

In Hafar al-Batin, near the border with Kuwait, Badriah al-Afit plans to vote. Saturday’s elections were the third time citizens have cast municipal ballots.

For the first time ever, women in Saudi Arabia have voted in an election.

Uber has proved popular with women in the wealthy desert state to get around amid limited public transportation and general unease about the safety of taxis, said Al-Nahda’s Chief Executive Rasha Alturki.

According to reports, women accounted for less than 10 percent of registered voters in the elections held Saturday as female voters overcame obstacles ranging from bureaucratic hurdles to lack of transport in the ultra-conservative monarchy. The late King Abdullah, who died in January, issued a decree in 2011 authorizing women to vote.

Centre heads said they had received clear instructions to ease procedures to allow all voters, especially the older ones, to elect their municipal councilors.

“Now women have a voice”, Awatef Marzooq said after casting her ballot for the first time at a school in the capital.

Gender segregation at public facilities meant that female candidates were unable to directly meet the majority of voters – men – during their campaigns.

Otaibi won a seat in the Madrika district of Mecca, the holiest city of Islam, and where all the other successful candidates were men, the official Saudi Press Agency reported in a list of preliminary results.

Her daughter, Sahar Hassan Nasief, said the experience marked “the beginning” of greater rights for women in Saudi Arabia, who are not allowed to drive and are governed by laws that give men the ultimate say over aspects of their lives like marriage, travel and higher education.

The municipal council races across the kingdom also included the first female candidates – more than 950 in total – seen as pioneers by many but also denounced by some hard-line Islamists as unfit for a public role.

Al-Bar also confirms that Lama al-Suleiman won in the western city of Jiddah, Saudi Arabia’s second largest city.

Mona Abu Suliman, a media personality and consultant in Riyadh, said that even if women don’t win many seats, just going through this process is important.