Dear readers:
Happy New Year to you! The year 2005 passed so fast.
We hardly realized that President George W. Bush had just taken his oath of office. But thank God, one-fourth of the period of his presidency is also over with the year’s end.
Different analysts are remembering 2005 in different contexts. For the Bush Administration, it was an important year full of successes in the war on terror. Others are calling it a year that increased the gulf between civilizations.
To some analysts, 2005 will be remembered as the year of natural disasters. Some intellectuals believe that 2005 is the year in which the flower of democracy sprouted in the desert. They point out that Egypt and Iraq saw free elections after nearly three decades. But some analysts are calling these elections the beginning of an Islamic revolution, because the Muslim Brotherhood party won five times more seats in the Egyptian Parliament than in the past. Similarly, in Iraq religious parties scored electoral success despite the presence of foreign forces in their country.
However, very few analysts noted the fact that the year 2005 can also be called the year of the woman because of women’s political successes during this time. Although the West has all along prided itself for having guaranteed unmatched women’s rights and gender equality, it is the continent of Asia and not the West that took the distinguished honor of electing a woman as head of state for the first time in the history of the world. It earned this distinction when the Israeli parliament elected Golda Mier as the country’s Prime Minister [1969-1974]. Asia also elected the world’s second women head of government as when India elected Indira Gandhi as its prime minister [1966-77 and 1980-84], and Chandrika Bandranaike came to power in Sri Lanka [President 1994-2005].
Until recently, Europe had the distinction of having elected just one woman as head of government – Britain’s Margaret Thatcher. Yet, Asia saw many family heads of states, including Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, and Bangladesh’s former and current Prime Ministers Sheikh Haseena Wajid and Begum Khaleda Zia respectively. In 2005, we find that the little known tiny African country of Liberia has elected renowned economist Ellen Johnson Sirleaf as the country’s president in elections held in November 2005. Liberian elections were followed by polls in the Latin American country of Chile where another woman, Dr. Michelle Bachelet, secured 53.5 percent of the vote. She also easily won the second round of elections and became the first woman president of the country.
Asian women were also not behind in the race to win public offices during the year. In Afghanistan, where elections were held after a lapse of 30 years, 68 women were elected to Parliament, having a total of 249 seats, despite the fact that the country’s constitution has allocated 25 percent of the total seats for women. The situation is the same in Iraq where 25 percent of the Parliamentary seats have been allocated for women. Above all in Saudi Arabia, which is considered a highly conservative society, two businesswomen were elected, to the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce. In Japan, where only a male can become heir to the throne, a constitutional amendment is under consideration that, which if approved, would allow a woman to be heir to the throne as well.
It seems that women’s political successes in comparatively conservative and backward societies of Asia, Africa and Latin America, aroused the political zeal of Europe, where Germany elected Angela Merkel became the country’s first woman Chancellor in November elections. According to Geneva-based Inter Parliamentary Union, right now there are 6,960 women members of Parliament all over the world, which is 16.1 percent of the total number of parliamentarians. It means that every sixth Member of Parliament in the world is a woman.
Although little can be said about women’s future in the New Year, indications suggest that women shall remain in charge of the political game in many parts of the world. In the United States, Democrats are persistently talking about a woman presidential candidate in 2008 – Senator Hillary Clinton. Although she is busy in her re-election campaign for her Senate seat, it is widely believed that Clinton is paving the way for her possible presidential bid. Matching Hillary’s presidential candidacy, the Republicans are also naming Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as a possible presidential candidate. If both major parties of the United States nominate women as their candidates for Presidential elections, it is certain that the presidency of the world’s lone superpower will be in the hands of a woman in 2008. Then men may have to launch a struggle for their rights!
