Daily Star - 20 percent women's quota in polls not enough

Females remain hugely under-represented in politics, other decision-making positions

By Dalila Mahdawi
Daily Star staff

BEIRUT: Following years of lobbying by civil-society organizations, Lebanon’s Cabinet on Friday approved the adoption of a women’s quota for the municipal elections. After the rejection of a proposal by Interior and Municipalities Minister Ziyad Baroud calling for a women’s quota of 30 percent, Cabinet agreed women should form a minimum of 20 percent of all candidates on ballot lists for the elections, which are slated for June.
The decision to implement a women’s quota comes shortly after the 30th anniversary of the UN Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), which Lebanon signed in 1996. But as Lebanese women still remain hugely under-represented in politics and other decision-making positions, Beirut has only paid lip service to the idea of gender equality. Lebanon remains a firmly patriarchal society whose politics is dominated by feudal affiliations and political dynasties.
During Lebanon’s parliamentary elections in June last year, only 12 out of 587 candidates were women, and only four of those women – Bahia Hariri, Gilberte Zouein, Nayla Tueni and Strida Geagea – were elected to the 128-member Parliament. Only two women – Raya Haffar Hassan and Mona Ofeish – were selected for Cabinet posts. Since Lebanese women were granted suffrage in 1953, there have never been more than six women parliamentarians at the same time. Civil society activists say the paltry figures should be a cause of great embarrassment for a country that likes to brand itself as having the most open society in the Arab world.
But while a quota will help bring in more unfamiliar female faces into decision-making positions, many say it should be complemented by other efforts to promote women in politics. “The quota is a short-term solution to help move women into decision-making and leadership role but it’s not a long-term solution to women’s political participation,” says Nadya Khalife, women’s rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. More needs to be done on a grass roots level to help women move into decision-making roles, she adds. “What we need is to equip women at the local level first, help them acquire the skills needed to run efficient campaigns among other skills to then prepare them to take on leadership positions at the national level.”
For Nada Hachoui, who plans to run as a candidate in the Beirut municipality, the quota is both a blessing and a curse. “They are finally taking women into consideration,” she tells The Daily Star. “But it’s only 20 percent.”
Nadine Moawad of Nasawiya, a collective of feminists in Beirut, agrees that while a quota is an “important” step toward gender equality, the figure approved by Cabinet was too low. “Women make up over 50 percent of the country’s population, so why should they only have a quota of 20 percent?”
But while women constitute a demographic majority in Lebanon, their voting patterns appear to be no different to that of their male counterparts. A study on the participation of Lebanese women during the 2009 elections published last month by the Lebanese Council of Women (LCW) found that while more women than men voted in the elections, more than two-thirds did not vote for women candidates.
Khalife blames the sidelining of women leaders on Lebanon’s sectarian political system. “It makes it very difficult for women to enter [politics],” she says. “Plus, women have not been brought up to take up leadership skills and to pursue a career in politics because this area of work is still pretty much seen as a man’s world.” In this regard, a quota will help push more women into politics. “Quotas are technical mechanisms which have been proven the world over to work,” says Lina Abou-Habib, executive director of Collective for Research and Training on Development-Action. She is nevertheless quick to add her disappointment over the 20 percent allocation. “This is way below the agreed standard we should have reached in 2005 in accordance with the Beijing Platform,” which calls for the implementation of a 30-percent quota by 2005. “It’s too soon to celebrate,” she believes.
Help in building the capacities, capabilities and credibility of women leaders is just as important as a quota, the women agree. “We need women who are effective and who know what to do, not just how to be a pretty face,” Hachoui says.