The difficult part is to decide where to send her after the arrest. The Commission for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice has made it clear that Manal’s act does not fall under its jurisdiction, because she committed a violation of the law. On the other hand, the police stand is that Manal has not committed any security violation, but only a traffic violation, which obviously falls under the authority of the traffic department. However, our traffic department is confused about the issue, as it never handled a woman violator in the past.
Shoura Councilor Najeeb Al-Zamil has summed up the issue of women’s driving as an issue of our own creation with its origin in a fear of the unknown, compounded by hypothetical situations in the event of permitting women to drive. As a result, the Saudi society is left bewildered and unable to see a way out.
No other society in the world has encountered a similar situation because of the problem’s simplicity. After putting the cart before the horse over the past many decades, we now do not know how to put the horse at its rightful place so that we can ride at a normal pace. We solved our problem by recruiting peasants from poor countries, who knew nothing about cars, to work here as drivers. The result is that even women carrying doctoral degrees are forced to hire uneducated peasant laborers.
Our attempts to solve the problem — while we are scared of a final decision — have left us in a situation comparable to a scene in some absurd drama. We behave like a man endlessly going round a post believing that he has traveled a long distance.
Every citizen has the right to oppose women driving. On the other hand, he does not have the right to force his view on the rest of society. He should not unnecessarily worry about the accidents he fears Saudi women would cause, because any driver in the country is subject to strict regulations. He should not worry about the conduct of Saudi youths toward women drivers. Indeed, as Saudi youths have been brought up in a Shariah-based education system and lifestyle, it is an affront to suggest that their behavior toward women would be worse than that of youth in the rest of the world, who grew up under non-Shariah systems.
Just imagine what would have happened to our education system if we had left the issue of women’s education for debates. Instead of starting girls’ schools, we would have continued arguing endlessly about the risks involved in going out to schools and universities.
Let Manal, or any other woman for that matter, drive her car to take her children to school or hospital, to go to the supermarket or to her workplace, without putting herself at the mercy of a driver who could run away at any time.
