Saudi woman Salma bint Hizab al-Oteibi won a seat in the Madrakah’s municipal council in Mecca, in the country’s first ever elections open to female voters and candidates.
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Overall results were to be announced later by the election commission.
Saturday’s election only fills two-thirds of seats in the municipal councils. “Regardless of the outcome, women were big winners today”, she said. “Women are gradually getting more space in social spectrum and the day is not far when we will participate in decision making with our brothers under the patronage of Custodian of the two Holy Mosques”.
And more than just one woman won: 17 women now have government positions across the country.
Results from the northern borders province, the southwestern province of Asir and the Eastern Province district of al-Ahsa, the only others to have been announced, had no successful women candidates.
The rights watchdog said the distance to voter registration centers and required ID cards that many women do not have hindered the process.
A Saudi woman won the elections!!! In Qassim, traditionally the most conservative part of the country, two women were elected but their names were not immediately released.
Saudi woman Fawzia al-Harbi, a candidate for local municipal council elections, shows her candidate biography at a shopping mall in Riyadh.
Men and women vote separately in the kingdom, where the sexes are strictly segregated. Gaining the right to vote marked “the beginning” of greater rights for women in Saudi Arabia.
Though there are no quotas for female council members, an additional 1,050 seats are appointed with approval by the king who could use his powers to ensure more women are represented.
Rasha Hefzi, a prominent businesswoman who won a seat in Jeddah, thanked all those who supported her campaign and trusted her, pledging: “What we have started, we will continue”. The councils are the only government body elected by Saudi citizens.
Saudi activist Ghada Ghazzawi tapes a selfie video marking a historical day for Saudi women as she arrives to vote for the municipal elections.
“I am not really anxious about the number, or to have any women winning”, Hatoon al-Fassi, an academic and women’s rights campaigner told BBC.
Saudi women heading to polling stations across the kingdom on December 12, 2015, both as voters and candidates. The all-female team of election volunteers applauded as she dropped her ballot in the box. “I can’t say there won’t be any change”, she said.
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Najla Khaled, a 24-year-old English literature major, described voting “as a huge step for women in Saudi”.
