Manama: Safa Al Hashem has made history in Kuwait by becoming the first woman lawmaker to win seats in two consecutive parliamentary elections.
Taking 2,036 votes on Saturday, Safa, who made her parliamentary debut in December, was ranked fifth on the 10-member list of the winners of the Third Constituency on Saturday. She was one of the eight women candidates who signed up to run despite concerns that the society was not ready to support women in parliament.
Only two women succeeded in winning seats. The other one, Maasouma Al Mubarak, made history in 2009 when she was one of the four women who were the first to be elected to the parliament. However, Maasouma could not repeat the feat in the February 2012 elections when all the 50 elected lawmakers were men. She did however win in the December elections.
Safa, born in 1964, holds a masters in business administration. She worked in the Ministry of Higher Education in 1994.
She was the founder, chairperson and manager of Advantage Consulting Company (ACC), a Kuwait-based company that provides management and business advisory services, her official biography said. She received the Female CEO of the Year award at the CEO Middle East Awards 2007 in Dubai.
Very active socially, she has more than 75,000 followers on her Twitter account.
