Arab Gulf women struggle for political equity

In a relatively short period of time, the women of the Arab Gulf region achieved a large stride toward making their own way to attain a greater position in the society, their mothers would have never dreamt of.

Although they ridicule the image the western mind has of the Arab woman who is voiceless and "her face does not show and her men relatives can control her fate," however, women in the Arab Gulf states admit that there is still before them much to do before they can play an integrated role in the politics and the economy in their countries; days as such when the majority of women in these conservative and rich societies are deprived of their right to education and expressing themselves in societies where men have total control.

Today, many Arab Gulf women have doctorates many of them from universities in the US and Europe. They can vote and be nominated in the elections in Qatar and Oman and they assume higher government posts in Kuwait; where in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates they run private businesses that bring them millions of dollars.

This week, however, the Arab Gulf women will cross an important barrier in Bahrain which gave woman equal rights to participate in the first local elections to be carried out in the country since three decades.