By Majd Othman

KUWAIT: Former education minister Moudi Al-Humoud told Kuwait Times on the sidelines of a discussion event held on Monday by Mudawi List Platform titled "Mudawi Diwaniya" that Kuwaiti women from an earlier stage are fully empowered at all levels, while their success in reaching the parliament depends on voters' trust, elections and nomination of women.

"We hope women have a better opportunity to win in the current elections, especially with the increase in the number of female candidates this time - 7 percent of total candidates - not to mention that many female candidates have distinct proposals that tackle national priorities. So, we hope to have more than one Kuwaiti woman in the parliament," she said.

Asrar Hayat

"Mudawi Diwaniya" was held at Volvo Studio in-cooperation with BNK Group and Volvo to discuss the journey of Kuwaiti women in political life and their chances of reaching the Abdullah Al-Salem Hall. Asrar Hayat, one of the founding members of Mudawi List, told Kuwait Times that a large percentage of female citizens are optimistic the election will result in extensive female representation, due to the great number of qualified candidates who have nominated themselves.

"The new election law is in women's favor, due to the system that obligates voters to vote through their civil ID, which will limit them to vote only for candidates that are in the same constituency as them. This means it will destroy many of the previous groupings, forgery in electoral lists, vote buying and byelections. Therefore, I hope the current election will give women a better opportunity to reach parliament and succeed in all other aspects in life," Hayat said. She claimed women in Kuwait are less corrupt compared to men, pointing out, "we have never heard of women buying votes or participating in byelections."

Noor Bin Haidar

Lawyer Noor Bin Haidar told Kuwait Times that despite her interest in empowering women in parliament, she believes voters should vote for those who adopt women's issues that she and the society care about. "When candidates reach the parliament, my responsibility as a voter is to follow up with them to ensure their commitment to the issues they were elected on, and whether they benefit the community and women. In addition, voters should take advantage of the importance of their votes and apply pressure on representatives/candidates over the issues they want to fix or highlight, because at the end, they cannot succeed without voters' votes," Bin Haidar said.

Regarding the values document signed by some conservative candidates, Bin Haidar said from a legal perspective, the document violates the constitution. "Kuwaiti citizens do not expect representatives to teach us how to act, wear or speak - their role is limited to regulatory and legislative matters and not oversight of the people," she said.

"The absence of women from parliaments and councils in the previous years is a result of several things. In the previous period, the interests of female voters were not towards supporting female candidates. The role of the media and the government toward directing public opinion to empower women is very important. When the government supports women by appointing them in leading authorities and ministries and they preform well, then women will be elected to parliament," Bin Haidar said.

Moudi Al-Humoud

Former minister Humoud, the main speaker at the event, pointed out that female voters constitute the majority of the electoral base in Kuwait at around 53 percent, as a large number of men are in the military and police, who are excluded from the electoral process. She pointed out women in Kuwait joined political and democratic life less than 17 years ago, while men entered this field more than 60 years ago, so comparison is difficult.

Women need more political experience and more practice to be compared to men, despite the fact that women are quick in adapting to the political process, Humoud said. She added Kuwait women in 17 years succeeded to increase the percentage of their participation in elections by 17 percent, which is a great success and reflects women's determination to succeed.