Oman: One Woman Elected To Advisory Council

MUSCAT, Oman -- Oman says that only a single woman has been elected to the nation's top advisory council despite a push by female candidates that followed pro-reform unrest in the Arabian peninsula nation.

Voting for the 84-seat Shura Council was the first major test of public opinion in Oman since protests and clashes earlier this year calling for more jobs and a greater public voice in political affairs.

Official results released Sunday showed that only one woman won a seat. The 1,300 candidates in Saturday's voting included 77 women.

Oman's Sultan Qaboos bin Said had promised more powers for the nine-year-old council, which until now has only advised rulers. But no specific changes have been announced.

No women were on the outgoing council.

Comments

[Richard Pearce banned]

03:36 AM on 10/17/2011

So, let's see, that's one US supported dictatorship where a single woman has gotten elected to a powerless body, and one US supported dictatorship which has promised that at some point in the future, it will let women stand for election to a powerless body.

But, a country not that far away, where women are elected to the legislature, where women serve as vice-presidents of the country, where women are police officers, fly fighter planes, own and run businesses, outnumber men in universities, divorce their husbands, well that is the country that those who are concerned about women's rights are told is the worst of the worst on the issue.

[Monte924]

07:28 PM on 10/16/2011

Not surprising... Oman only got universal suffrage less than 10 years ago. In the US, after women got the right to vote in 1920, it wasn't until 1932 that a woman got elected to the US senate. Takes a lot of time for the idea of equality to spread to the masses and became truly mainstream. Takes a couple of generations for it to sink into society.