Iraqi women raise voices - for quotas

As an exiled opposition leader, Safia al-Souhail battled most of her life to get rid of Iraq's old government. Now she's fighting to get into the new one.

Since the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime, Ms. Souhail has been pleading a new cause: quotas for women in Iraq's new government - in the cabinet, in the national parliament, and in drafting the constitution. "They have seats for Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds, Assyrians," says the human rights activist, "and they didn't think that they should have a seat for [half of] the country?"

On Oct. 7, Souhail and women from around Iraq presented their demands to Paul Bremer, the top US administrator in Iraq. They wanted women to make up at least one-third of the committee drafting Iraq's new constitution, as well as "all political institutions," including the parliament and local councils.

But while such quotas featured prominently in Afghanistan's draft constitution, unveiled Nov. 3, the Coalition Provisional Authority has declined to support the idea in Iraq. "There are no plans for quotas," a CPA official says. "But we are planning on empowering women through ... women's organizations, democracy trainings, and involving them in the political process."

Without strong US support, especially in the opening stages, experts say women may be left out of Iraq's new government. "US support is very important, because you're talking about an interim authority," says Julie Ballington of the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance in Stockholm. "Because of the moment of history, it's the political will of the big players that determines whether quotas will be considered."

In recent years, an increasing number of countries, especially those shifting from dictatorship to democracy, have used quotas to make sure women are elected to national parliaments. In South Africa, after the African National Congress required women in lists of candidates for the 1994 elections, the proportion of women in parliament jumped to 27 percent, from 3 percent. In Rwanda, which set aside seats for women at the local and national levels, the number of women in parliament hit 49 percent in this year's elections - the highest level in any government in the world.

But in "postconflict" countries, quotas can cause tensions between transitional administrators and those they are supervising. In East Timor, a network of women pushed for quotas between 1999 and 2001, the period under UN administration. At their urging, the UN required quotas for local councils and civil service. The National Council, selected from the local councils, was 40 percent female.

When it came to quotas for the committee writing a new constitution, however, the UN balked. Citing objections from some Security Council members, the UN argued that quotas contravened free and fair elections. East Timorese opinion was divided. In the end, the National Council - including most of its women members - voted against quotas in the committee.

In the Arab world, only five countries have electoral quotas, four of them in North Africa. Worldwide, the average proportion of women in national parliaments is 14 percent. In countries with quotas, it is 17 percent. In the 22 Arab League member states, the average is 3.5 percent.

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