The People's Assembly descended into a shouting match as it debated a legislative amendment that will give more seats to women, reports Gamal Essam El-Din On Sunday the People's Assembly approved new legislation setting a quota of seats for women in parliament. The changes had been proposed by the ruling National Democratic Party's (NDP) Higher Council for Policies, led by Gamal Mubarak. The initiative, explained Amal Othman, chairwoman of the assembly's Constitutional and Legislative Affairs Committee, amends the 1972 law regulating the performance of the lower house of parliament, the People's Assembly, raising the number of parliamentary seats from 454 to 518. All 64 of the extra places are reserved for women. Othman also made clear the new rules will apply to the next parliamentary elections, due to be held in October 2010, when 32 districts across 28 governorates will field only female candidates. Two additional seats are to be reserved for women in 24 governorates, and four in the densely populated governorates of Cairo, Daqahliya, Sharqiya and Beheira. Moufid Shehab, minister of state for legal and parliamentary affairs, described the law as "positive discrimination". "It will be in force for a limited period, perhaps just two parliamentary terms," said Shehab. An explanatory note accompanying the law said that although women had made great strides in the last two decades these had yet to be reflected in terms of parliamentary representation. "In 2007 Egypt appointed its first female judges. Years earlier Egypt created the National Council for Women [NCW], a government agency headed by the First Lady Suzanne Mubarak, to empower women at all levels." The note added that "Egypt was the first Arab country to name female ambassadors, cabinet ministers and MPs." "In the parliamentary elections of 2005, just four women were elected to the People's Assembly," the note continued. "One of these resigned and currently the assembly has only three elected women, less than one per cent of the total." The note compared the situation in Egypt with that in Morocco, where 10.8 per cent of legislators are women, Syria, with 12 per cent, Sudan with 18.1 per cent and Tunisia, where 28.8 per cent of parliamentary seats are occupied by women. Although NDP MPs rallied behind the law, heaping praise on the NCW and Mrs Mubarak, it faced stiff objections from opposition and independent MPs. In a statement issued on Sunday, the Muslim Brotherhood said the law alone will not lead to women participating in parliamentary life. "Radical changes must first be introduced to create a more competitive and transparent political life regardless of sex or colour," the Brotherhood's statement said. The Brotherhood took the ruling NDP to task for turning the assembly into a toothless parliament and for discouraging many citizens, including women, from standing in elections. "Women candidates will be obliged to run in geographically vast districts without enjoying any kind of effective judicial supervision to ensure the integrity of the poll. The whole initiative is simply a waste of time, effort and money." The statement pointed out that between 1979 and 1986, 30 out of a total 360 parliamentary seats were reserved for women. "This seven-year experience left no positive results on parliamentary life and it is simply foolish to repeat the experience." Mahmoud Abaza, chairman of the Wafd Party, said he was dubious about claims that the law had been drafted in the interests of women. "This law was prepared in secret and at a haste to serve the interests of the ruling party," he argued. "It places women seeking to stand for parliament in an impossible position. They will have to campaign in constituencies 14 times bigger than the average district." Mohamed El-Omda, an independent MP, accused the National Council for Women, of imposing a Western liberal agenda on Egyptian society. "This law propagates imported values. It breaches the principle of equality with men and runs counter to Islamic values." El-Omda went on to warn that the law will open the door wide to other groups, especially Copts, to demand their own quota. El-Omda went on to rail that the leaders of the NCW and the National Council for Motherhood and Childhood had not only been educated abroad but sent their children to foreign universities and were busy soliciting funds from "American and European organisations with liberal agendas". "The NCW receives money from the national budget and does not have any legislative role," Shehab responded. "Many countries have instituted a quota for women in parliament. Does this mean that they are all importing American values wholesale?" "El-Omda sounds like a throwback to the 18th or 19th century," said parliamentary speaker Fathi Sorour. "We all know that reactionary forces stubbornly refuse to concede women any rights." In the verbal clash that ensued between opposition and NDP MPs, Saad Abboud accused the NDP of exploiting the issue of women's rights to increase the number of seats it hopes to control in parliament. "In the elections of 2005 the NDP fielded a handful of women. What has happened so suddenly to make the party such a champion of women's rights?" he asked. Abboud also recalled that Ahmed Ezz, the NDP's secretary for organisational affairs, forced his wife Shahinaz El-Naggar, a businesswoman who was elected to parliament in 2005, to resign from the People's Assembly when they married last year. "Ezz's behaviour hardly reflects a belief in equality," said Abboud.
