Women With Almost 17% Representation in Libya 200-Member ...

Thirty-three women have been elected to serve in Libya's General National Congress in the first free elections two weeks ago. The tally gives women 16.5 percent representation in the 200-member transitional authority.

In its analyses of the results announced earlier this week, womensnews quoted Samira Massoud, acting president of the Libyan Women's Union, a growing national organisation with membership in the thousands saying: "This is a very good starting point: 32 women elected with the parties and one independent," said

The tally gives women 16.5 percent representation in the 200-member transitional authority. In comparison, the United States, has a Congress comprised of 17 percent women.

Ms Massoud said that unlike sisters in neighbouring Tunisia and Egypt, women in Libya had almost no political history under Gaddafi or much experience in civil society activism.

In a surprise, Libya's landmark vote gave an edge to a liberal coalition over Islamist parties. The coalition is led by Mahmud Jibril, a former regime official who defected and became the international face of the 2011 revolution.

Commenting on Libya's landmark vote that gave an edge to a liberal coalition over Islamist parties Ms Massoud, is reported saying that Libyan society is afraid of the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafists, and that Libyan women fear being forced to wear the niqab, which covers the face, as is required of women in Saudi Arabia.

Those elected in the July 7 polling will appoint a new government and deliver a new constitution on the basis of a process still under debate.

Libyan women's next challenge according to womensnews now is securing a foothold in the committee of 60 that will draft a constitution.

Women benefitted in the polls from a so-called zipper system that required parties to alternate between male and female candidates not only within their lists but also across the top of their lists, it said.

Female candidates were just shy of half--545 of 1,206 candidates - of those vying for seats reserved for parties. Only 85 women out of 2,501 contenders took the risk to run as individual candidates.

Keeping in mind that women gained less than two percent of seats in neighbouring Egypt's parliament, international observers are praising the performance of Libyan women, with Sabra Bano, director of Gender Concerns International, based in The Hague, the Netherlands saying: "Seventeen percent is not a bad start to me.

Election observers ranging from the European Union and the United Nations to the US-based Carter Centre all celebrated the high turnout of female voters on election day in their preliminary reports.

Referring to Gaddafi and his green book, Ms Massoud said: "We are starting very fast. Libyan women could not practice politics before because there was room for only one."

She said a stigma was attached to the women visible in public life under Gaddafi, because he used them for sex rather than as a sounding board for ideas. "Women's organisations back then were small in numbers and under his control,? she said.

Women made up 45 percent - 1.3 million - of the registered voters in this election and turned out in high numbers to vote. All parties were obliged to include women in their lists.

The majority of the elected female representatives reportedly come from the ranks of either Jibril's National Forces Alliance, NFA, or those of the Justice and Construction Party, which was launched by Libya's Muslim Brotherhood.

Source: http://www.tripolipost.com/articledetail.asp?c=1&i=8854

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