Analysts and activists predicted on Sunday that at least two women might win outside the 15-seat women’s quota in Wednesday’s parliamentary elections.
“I expect that this time four or five women might win seats outside the quota because several women have proven themselves in the previous House and they have strong bases that will re-elect them without the need for a quota,” said Director of the Centre for Strategic Studies at the University of Jordan Musa Shteiwi.
Shteiwi, who is also an expert in women’s issues, said two women are heading national tickets and their chances are also high to win seats in the 150-House without the quota.
“This is a new change for women and will most probably increase their chances of winning outside the quota,” Shteiwi told The Jordan Times.
The government recently increased the number of seats allocated for women from 12 to 15, a step that guaranteed that women will have a representative in each of the Kingdom’s 12 governorates and the three badia districts.
Two hundred and fifteen women are running for the Wednesday elections to compete for the 150-seat Lower House.
Secretary General of the Jordanian National Commission for Women Asma Khader agreed with Shteiwi, saying that some women who have performed well in previous parliaments will be depending on the tribal base and voters’ faith in their performance.
“We have already witnessed a similar experience when Madaba deputy Falak Jamaani won in the 2007 elections outside the quota. She might do it again this year because she had a consistent and strong performance in the Lower House,” Khader told The Jordan Times.
Khader expressed her optimism that the performance of the former female deputies will “surely help increase the number of women winning this year”.
“The more women we have, the stronger they are under the Dome, because they will be encouraged to unify their ranks on many national issues, including women’s issues, and their parliamentary experience will further mature,” the former minister added.
Editor-in-Chief of Al Ghad daily Jumana Ghneimat, however, had lower expectations, predicting that only women leading national tickets “might have a good chance at winning outside the quota system”.
“I believe it is going to be impossible for women to win outside the quota because the competition will be fierce. The only hope is the two women who are heading national lists [former MP Abla Abu Olbeh and journalist Rula Hroub],” Ghneimat said.
Tribalism still dominates the scene of elections and our society still perceives women as followers
She blamed the voting system that allows voters to cast their ballots for only one deputy in their local district and one national list. “Tribalism still dominates the scene of elections and our society still perceives women as followers,” Ghneimat told The Jordan Times.
Oraib Rintawi, director of Al Quds Centre for Political Studies, echoed Ghneimat’s prediction, saying that only “one woman might win outside the quota system”.
“For the past 24 years, only three women won in direct competition and they had special circumstances that helped them back then. I highly doubt that more than one woman will win outside the quota this time,” Rintawi said.
Unlike the rest, he noted that Jordan’s experience with proportional lists is new “so it is really hard to predict if the two women heading these lists have any chance of winning a seat”.
A study released in March 2007 by UN Women attributed women’s failure to obtain seats in parliament to social and political factors.
Other obstacles included the one-person, one-vote system, which the study said deters many women from running for parliament, and a lack of financial resources for female candidates.
The government first introduced a six-seat women’s quota ahead of the 2003 parliamentary elections.
Four years later, seven women were elected to the Lower House: six via the quota system, while the seventh, Jamaani, became the first woman to win a seat in the Lower House through direct competition after the quota was introduced.
The temporary elections law for 2010 doubled the women’s quota to 12 seats and raised the number of Lower House seats from 110 to 120.
Thirteen women were elected to the 16th Parliament, 12 through the quota and one through direct competition in Amman’s 3rd District — Reem Badran.
Rana Husseini
http://jordantimes.com/womens-chances-in-polls-expected-to-slightly-impr...
