Gulf | Saudi Arabia
Driving through barriers of silence
Hatoon Al Fassi, a history professor from Riyadh, wrote a piece last month that listed all the recent statements made by senior leaders, including King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz, asserting that the state had no problem with allowing women to drive and that it was a decision left to families.
- By Heba Saleh, Financial Times
- Published: 00:12 December 8, 2007
Riyadh: Hatoon Al Fassi, a history professor from Riyadh, wrote a piece last month that listed all the recent statements made by senior leaders, including King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz, asserting that the state had no problem with allowing women to drive and that it was a decision left to families.
Despite its calm and understated tone, no Saudi newspaper agreed to publish the piece - a sign of the sensitivity of the matter.
Dr Al Fassi had written that some women, after hearing the leaders' statements, asked their local traffic departments for driving permits but were told by astonished bureaucrats that it was not allowed.
She called on the state to inform officials of its "true position" on driving so that "we could close this issue and move on . . . instead of wasting time on a matter that . . . [other] Islamic countries have resolved a long time ago."
Women's issues are a key battleground in the confrontation between Saudi Arabia's conservatives and its liberals. It is a big part of the debate launched in the aftermath of the attacks on the US of September 11, 2001, which were carried out mainly by Saudi nationals, and forced the kingdom to reconsider some of the implications of its ideology.
This fight is waged in the newspapers and in internet chatrooms. While liberals press for bolder reforms, conservatives bemoan attempts to "westernise" society, "corrupt" its women and dilute the Islamic nature of the kingdom.
The Saudi state's ambiguity on issues related to empowering women frustrates liberals but it is still defended by many as prudent policy in a country where society is more conservative than its leaders, and where the opinions of the religious establishment define acceptable behaviour. Unlike all other Muslim countries, the kingdom bans women from driving because clerics believe it could lead to sinful behaviour and uncontrolled mixing of the sexes.
Pandemonium
"You can't say women should drive tomorrow," says Nadia Bakhurji, an architect who runs her own firm. "Society needs to be prepared otherwise you could have pandemonium." Those who want women to drive say there is a need for tough laws to deter attacks against female motorists. They also want female sections in police stations and traffic departments as well as mobile car repair services.
But none of this appears to be on the government's agenda now. To some it means the authorities lack the political will to push through bold measures loosening restrictions on women. "We don't take it any more that it is the problem of society, or that it is the families," says Dr Al Fassi.
"These are unacceptable excuses, how long do they want to wait? The problem of drivers is a big pain. I am at the mercy of drivers, friends and neighbours who drive us to school. There are other women who can't afford drivers."
Although more than half of the kingdom's university graduates are women, they make up only 13.5 per cent of the workforce. In recent years, the state has signalled its support for women's work by allowing them into more professions and appointing some to prominent positions, but the rulers continue to balk at anything that could be seen as an overt challenge to religious orthodoxy.
But, some argue, the mere fact that there is a debate about womens' role in society represents progress.
Dialogue
"There is now a loud dialogue about women's issues that did not exist in the past," said Dr Samia Al Amoudi a professor of medicine. "We have broken the barrier of silence."
But even those pressing the government to become more assertive say they are under no illusion about the difficulties.
Not only would the leaders have to take on the powerful clerics, but they would also have to confront centuries of conservative tribal tradition.
Two recent cases highlight the problems. Last month a court sentenced a woman who was gang-raped to six months in prison and 200 lashes because she had been in a car with an unrelated man when she was abducted and attacked. The rapists were also sentenced.
A court last year ruled to separate a married couple against their will, because the woman's half brothers sued on the grounds that the husband's family was socially inferior.
Neither ruling conforms with Islam argues Suhaila Hammad, an outspoken writer who supports women's rights from a religious perspective.
"Unfortunately, tradition and customs control many people here and they confuse them with Islamic law," she says.
"As for the argument that we should introduce wo-men's rights gradually, I say Islam came 1,428 years ago. Are all these centuries not enough to understand it?"
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