Women MNAs set to make changes

Shehnaz Begum sells samosas in a small street of Rawalpindi city. She is just 35 years old, but her grey hair, the dark circles around her eyes and the wrinkles make for an old woman.

A mother of six, she was jailed under the Hudood Ordinance, a controversial law passed under the former military dictator, General Zia-ul-Haq.

"I was imprisoned on the active urging of my suspicious, violent and abusive husband. The law did not take into account his brutality, just his suspicions about my behaviour," she says.

Shehnaz is pinning her hopes on a turnaround in her fate in the growing number of women who have been elected to parliament in this round of elections.

"Only a woman can truly understand another woman's suffering, and can fight for women's rights. I hope these women will save us," she says, referring to the women parliamentarians elected on reserved seats, the first time there has been such a high ratio of women's representation in the Pakistani parliament.

This has immense significance for hundreds of women like Shehnaz who are still languishing in prison in the country on discriminatory legislation such as the Hudood laws.

"We will pass the legislations to eradicate the discriminatory rituals like 'karo kari' honour killings. We will try to fight for the rights. But changes cannot happen overnight. But we definitely can make a beginning," states Fauzia Habib, who has been nominated to parliament by former prime minister Benazir Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party.

This is a sea change in the parliamentary history of Pakistan in which dozens of women legislators will represent "suppressed and oppressed" women of the country when the first assembly session will be convened.

The house of 342 seats will have 60 women nominated on reserved seats by the various political and religious parties in addition to the 12 who have won on contested seats.

Saira, a struggling, lower middle class housewife from Islamabad, also feels elated. "Women understand certain things more, I think they may help increase the education and health budgets and see inflation requiring more attention than making bombs. This should bring positive changes."

Many hopes are pinned on Fauzia and other women parliamentarians.

Women's organisations have been rallying and lobbying for 33 per cent women's representation for over 20 years, in the belief that the power imbalance in political institutions helps maintain a patriarchal status quo.

In the local body polls held last year, the Musharraf regime granted the quota, and 33 per cent elected local councillors are women. The women's movement and human rights activists hope this, along with the changing face of the parliament, will make a significant impact.

"It is historical as women have never been given the representation in the parliament in such large numbers. It might not be a very big achievement, but it will bring a cultural change and the acceptance of the participation of women in the politics. This has always been considered a domain for men," says Farzana Bari, director, centre for women studies at Quaid-e-Azam University.

But with Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal, the alliance of religious parties, which has gained significant power in two provinces and thereby in the senate, women activists have reservations that they will hamper the women's movement, and promote what they define as women's empowerment, often at variance with feminists.

"The women nominated by the political parties will toe the parties agenda especially the women from MMA as their leaders never supported women's fight against the discriminatory laws. And their perspective is different. So the fight will continue inside and outside the parliament," Farzana Bari asserts.