CAIRO: Former United States President Jimmy Carter, in a four-day trip to Egypt last week, hailed Egypt's recent elections as “historic” and “accurate to the will of the people.” However, Carter expressed personal discomfort with the low representation of women in Egypt's newly elected lower house of parliament. “I believe women were failed by of the cancelation of the quota system and because political parties put them on the bottom of their lists,” Carter told the press at a conference on Friday. A quota for female representation in parliament was enacted during the reign of former President Hosni Mubarak, but was since revoked. Each party contending for votes in the recent elections were required to put at least one female candidate on their party lists, however many placed women candidates toward the end of their lists. The former President's visit to Egypt came just as elections for Egypt's lower house of parliament came to a close. The Muslim Brotherhood's political arm, the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), won the largest single share of votes in the elections, followed in a close second by the Salafi al-Nour Party. Together, the two Islamist parties won 60 percent of the seats. A small number of women ran for the parliamentary elections, with very few winning seats after the votes were tallied. The Egyptian Center for Women Rights reported that only three women out of the 212 candidates won seats, or 1.4 percent. The three winning candidates are Margeret Azer from al-Wafd party's list in Cairo, Hanan Abou al-Gheit in Damietta and Sana'a al-Said from the Egyptian Coalition list in Assiut, south of Cairo. The Carter Center issued a statement on Friday urging Egypt to form a constitution that will allow for full civilian oversight over the affairs of the nation as well as the military itself. Egypt's newly elected parliament is tasked with forming a 100-person committee set to write the country's post-Mubarak Constitution. However, activists fear that the military will refuse to cede power to a democratically elected, civilian-led government. “The ultimate success of Egypt's transition will depend on the earliest possible handover of power to a civilian government that is accountable to the Egyptian people,” read the Center's statement. BM ShortURL: http://goo.gl/AuMDb Tags: featured, Jimmy Carter Section: Egypt, Latest News, Women
