RIYADH, 29 February 2008 — The founder of the Ansar Al-Marah Women’s Rights Society has condemned the Ministry of Social Affairs for denying initial approval to establish the society.
The women’s rights activists in the Kingdom were eagerly anticipating the establishment of Ansar Al-Marah — the first civil society group dedicated to supporting women’s rights in the country.
Wajehah Alhwaider, a rights activist and writer, told Arab News recently that Saudi women see rights groups, such as Ansar Al-Marah, as a platform that would deliver their voice to decision makers and would speed up efforts to resolve issues pertaining to women.
She added that in the last few years much economic, educational and political reform have been accomplished but not when it comes to women’s issues. “Women still face discrimination in many aspects of lives, including education, employment, civil affairs and the justice system,” she said. “Women make up 70 percent of those enrolled in universities but only make up 5 percent of the work force.”
Al-Watan newspaper yesterday reported, quoting a source at the Ministry of Social Affairs, that the ministry has not given approval to establish the society. The source claimed that authorizing such bodies is not the ministry’s responsibility.
Suliman Al-Salman, the founder of the group, said not allowing this group to function is unfair. “We need an official response from the ministry stating their reasons for this rejection,” he said.
The group applied for official status on Nov. 22, but they have yet to receive a response. “If authorizing bodies is not one of the ministry’s responsibilities then it should have informed us before accepting our application,” said Al-Salman. “We are a properly constituted body that would provide humanitarian assistance to women who need specialized help with complicated issues, but officialdom tends to deny us instead of embracing and supporting us.”
He added that his society doesn’t enjoy support in some official circles because the organization plans to have a workplace comprised of both genders, which is illegal under Saudi law unless clearly segregated areas are provided.
The proposed society would be comprised of men and women working together, said Al-Salman, who dismisses such segregation as a clear attempt to marginalize women in the workplace. Smaller businesses, for example, might not be able to afford investing in redundant facilities (such as office space) in order to maintain the segregation, so they simply choose not to hire women. And in companies that have separate areas for women, they tend to be smaller and set to the sidelines of the main operations, which also contributes to marginalizing women in the workplace.
The law does not require companies to provide equally distributed duplicate facilities, and many employers simply prefer not to hire women than to bother with the gender-segregation rules or any threats or surprise inspections from the moral police checking to ensure such laws are being enforced.
Al-Salman said the system is clearly designed to allow men to monopolize all available jobs even as Saudi women are clearly becoming the country’s most highly educated population segment.
According to the latest statistics released by Ministry of Social Affairs, there are 435 officially sanctioned societies. Of these societies, 31 are dedicated to helping women.
