Pages
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
Topic Discussion III
Participation in
Democratic Decision-Making:
The Vital Voices of Women, Civil Society and
Pluralism
Room 3
(13 of 16 pages)
Today, as we undergo a third revolution, the information revolution, which is
based on intellectual capabilities and democratic principles and so on, now is the time for women to convince other
women to attain their rights, for you are not given your rights, you have to go out and get them and women have
to understand this. They have to obtain their rights and they have to participate. Naturally, today politics is
based on a conditionality of economics before the fall of the Berlin Wall. Today women have to be involved in the
economic process and as an extension of the economic role comes the political domain. In my country, what was done
to facilitate the participation of women went along the following lines. We find women judges, we find training
schools for women teachers in order to secure a place for women in the process of educating the younger generations.
There are other areas in which women can take up positions where they would be competing with men in different
managerial positions. We also find that women are given more chances to be able to integrate in the educational
system and integrate their daughters into schools, but we still have the burden of the past, so we have to overcome
the heritage that obstructs the participation of women. We did give women the vote before many other democracies
but we still find a heavy tradition that cannot be overcome overnight. We should try to mitigate the conflict between
generations. Thus there is a major and heavy burden that should be combated. We should influence and impact ways
of thinking in order to achieve an effective democracy that allows a true place for women in the democratic process.
Thank you.
Speaker: My name is Sultan Altmani (ph), I'm a Member of Parliament from the Opposition Nasserite Party.
I will be addressing three issues. First, the constraint that limits the participation of women in political life
in our society and I believe that this issue has three dimensions: illiteracy, which is a major constraint; traditions
and conventions, predominant in our society, which colonialism and backward regimes have imposed backwardness;.
Needless to say, religious creed has no role in this. I am not one of those who believe that it is our religious
creed that impedes the participation of women. On the contrary, our Islamic religious creed urges women to be effective
and participating members of society. I believe that it is the traditions of decades of backwardness that imposed
these hindrances. The third constraint is the electoral system which is embodied in our current Yemeni electoral
system is based on the individual, personal constituency and this restricts the candidacy of women. Even the two
cases mentioned by Dr. Saidi (ph) was done by a political decision. Women did not succeed or win elections, except
in both elections we had only two women. Usually it is two women who win seats in parliament and this is due to
the electoral system itself. As for the constraints facing the establishment of a civil society, we find that authorities
in our country still try to orient civil society institutions to become dependent and cronies of the regime. The
true role of these institutions has not yet been absorbed. Membership of these institutions is still dependent
on the will of the ruling party. Even the establishment of such organizations, if they are not under the control
of the ruling party they will not be established. There are other such organizations of civil society that are
mere names or fronts but which are not actual organizations.
Another issue I want to talk about is decision-making. There is no readiness up to date for the ruling party to
accept opposing views. We find that the media that is controlled by the ruling party refuses to print any viewpoints
of the opposition and there are other points of view that would achieve the equilibrium talked about. For example,
the public functions, the public office, these are under the control of the ruling party. The same applies to the
armed forces, public functions and other forces. All these should be run in a different way and this would facilitate
the process of democracy.
Thank you.
Speaker: I am from the Democratic Nasserite Party and from the Opposition Council in Yemen. In fact, the
picture is not as my colleague, Mr. Altmani presented. Had it not been for democracy we would not have been in
such a conference, and Mr. Sultan would not have been able to say what he said before all those present. But there
is a certain shortcoming in Yemen, which is the gap between the rights entrenched in the law and the inability
to implement these laws, and perhaps this inability is the result of the performance of the authorities or perhaps
it's because of the poor capacities that are required in the process of transition towards democracy. For democracy
has major shortcomings. The gap between the aspirations and the available capacities for the citizens in need of
achieving his daily needs. Our platforms are still closer to rhetoric and poetry than it is to the language of
science and this allows the Opposition to overbid and allows the State to bypass the Opposition and marginalia
it. But what we have today is the result of many sacrifices that we have made throughout the years.
|
[ Introduction ] [ Worldwide Activities ] [ What We Do ] |