JEDDAH, 9 April 2006 — Hopes for businesswomen to stand for election to the board of directors of the Madinah Chamber of Commerce and Industry have been dashed. The applications of the four women who sought a place on the board have been rejected for not fulfilling the requirements.
Competition between male nominees, however, remains in the early stages. As of yesterday, the applications of 14 businessmen had been accepted as candidates for the 10 board seats.
There are a total of 15 seats on the board of directors and the remaining five are appointed by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry which supervises the elections.
“Applications by both men and women who did not meet the criteria have been rejected; it is not just the women’s applications,” said a source.
Among the criteria is that the applicant be Saudi, a member of the chamber, a college graduate, has renewed his or her membership for more than three years and that he or she has a commercial registration at the chamber.
Many of the businesswomen in Madinah either do not have a commercial registration or have not renewed their membership in the chamber. “An exemption can be made if the applicant has a college degree, has a commercial registration and has renewed membership for more than a year,” said the source.
The four women whose applications were rejected are requesting that the ministry exempt them from the regulations.
“The regulations were set by the ministry a long time ago and the women should have followed the rules,” said Nisreen Qattan, director of the Businesswomen’s Center in Madinah, which was opened four months ago.
According to a survey made by the center, there are 268 businesses registered in women’s names in Madinah; these women are eligible to be candidates but only 43 of the businesses are actually managed by women.
“Even as voters, none of the women came forward to ask about regulations and procedures,” Nisreen explained to Arab News.
There is a general sense of society not being ready to accept women playing a bigger role in the chamber. “Few of the women who are running businesses have real business skills or investment awareness. In my work plan during the first year at the center, I’m targeting these businesswomen in order to increase their awareness of their roles and improve their skills,” said Nisreen.
