Lina Mahmoud attends events marking International Women's Day "In the name of 2,400 Egyptian families, in the name of oppressed women whose husbands, brothers and sons have been detained since last October, I declare that we will resist until our men are set free or we die," declared Samah Abu Shitta, who had travelled from Arish to Cairo on Saturday to address a meeting held by several NGOs to mark International Women's Day. Dressed in a black niqab (face veil) and armed with a powerful voice, Abu Shitta presented a forceful testimony of what has happened to her family since the mass arrests in Sinai that followed terrorist attacks targeting several tourist resorts last October: "Eleven male members of my family were arrested last October; their ages range from 11 to 35 years," her voice boomed. "They are not detainees; they are hostages." Abu Shitta has marched in three demonstrations demanding the release of the prisoners taken after the bombings on 7 October. According to Marwa Farouk, of the Women's Committee of the Socialist Studies Centre, Abu Shitta's struggle is all too familiar. "Throughout history women have participated in similar battles; they have been at the core of all revolutions," says Farouk. "And after the battle is won society expects them to go back to their homes and raise their kids." But Farouk urged women to remain politically active -- a message in line with the theme, "Women and political participation", of this year's Women's Day. The world celebrates women on 8 March, the day in 1857 when women in New York went on strike protesting against the inhumane conditions in clothing sweatshops. Egypt's own celebration comes a week later, on 16 March, the date in 1919 when women participated for the first time in a demonstration against the British occupation. This year's celebration, which aims to promote positive discrimination to elected bodies, was held at the Cairo Library and included speeches by representatives of the sponsoring organisations, including the New Woman Foundation, Women and Memory Forum, Women's Issues Foundation and Al-Nadim Centre for the Rehabilitation of Victims of Violence. The event also honoured several individuals -- Ain El- Hayat Saleh, Soheir Ismail El-Sayed, the protesting women in Arish, in the person of Samah Abu Shitta, and the late Dorria Shafiq. Shafiq was a leading figure in the national struggle against British occupation, and in 1951 led a march of 1,500 women to the Egyptian parliament demanding women's political rights, amendments to the personal status law and equal pay for women. Shafiq also established the now defunct women's political party, Daughters of the Nile, in 1953. Saleh leads education and health campaigns in the working class district of Imbaba while El-Sayed, from Al- Baradaa in Qalyubiya, is the first woman to hold the post of town chief. In her speech Ragia Omran, chairwoman of the New Woman Foundation, revisited the 15-day sit-in at the Press Syndicate organised by Shafiq 60 years ago to demand political rights for women. Omran asked just how much progress in empowering women politically had been made in the intervening years. "Despite progress in women's rights with regards to education and legislation, women's political participation remains weak," she said, noting that in 2004 women occupied just 2.4 per cent of parliamentary seats. Although laws in Egypt do not prohibit women from political participation a patriarchal society inhibits them from exercising their rights, said Omran. Women are still burdened with the traditional image of housewife, she added, and most are too poor to think of political participation. Positive discrimination, as practised in Morocco, Tunisia, Jordan and Sudan, was the answer, she said. In Sudan 20 per cent of the parliamentary seats are allocated to women, in Morocco 10 per cent and in Jordan 2.9 per cent. Since 1987, when Egypt repealed a 1979 law specifying that at least 30 parliamentary seats be reserved for women, female representation in parliament has slumped. In 1979 women occupied 8.9 per cent of parliamentary seats -- the highest figure since 1957. In 2004 that figure dropped to 2.4 per cent. Hala Kamal, from the Women and Memory Forum, linked the lack of political participation to upbringing and education. Children, she said, are born into families in which parents exercise complete authority. They go to schools where teachers do the same. "The situation becomes more poignant at university," she said, "where security forces and the university administration waste the last chance for students to lead any social or political activities." Magda Adli, from Al-Nadim Centre, said that whenever she hears the words political participation two images come to her mind -- that of a woman who has adopted patriarchal values wholesale and of a woman beaten by her husband at home because she did not cook or was late. "That doesn't mean that women's political participation is unimportant but it must go hand in hand with the elimination of violence against women, especially in the family," she concluded.
