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Row over women in Cabinet

KUWAIT CITY: Muslim hardliners walked out of the Kuwaiti Parliament’s inaugural meeting on Sunday.

They were protesting against the absence of head scarves on two women Cabinet Ministers.

The nine men walked out as the Ministers began taking their oath of office.

They returned only when the two women, Modhi al-Homoud and Nouria al-Subeih, had been sworn in.

The Cabinet was formed after Kuwait’s ruler dissolved Parliament and ordered fresh elections held May 17 because Cabinet and the 50-person legislature could not work together.

Further conflicts between the two branches of government are expected, however, as the election put 24 religious hardliners, looking to impose religious law on the U.S. ally, into Parliament.

Al-Homoud, Minister of State for Housing and Development, ignored attempts by conservative lawmakers remaining in the chamber to take the floor as she read her oath, wearing a skirt rather than the headscarf and long robes demanded by religious hardliners.

Education Minister Nouria al-Subeih, who does dress conservatively though not with a headscarf, was not interrupted. She went through a similar situation when she was first appointed in April 2007.

Legislator Jamaan al-Hirbish said he wanted to register a “reservation” because the two women were breaking an obscure law instituted by conservatives in 2005 after women were allowed to vote.

The law required women politicians to abide by Islamic codes.

Many women in Kuwait wear headscarves and long dresses, but Islamic dress is not mandatory like in neighbouring Saudi Arabia.

Kuwaiti women failed to win any seats in the two elections since they were given the right to run for office and vote, but one did come close in the last contest.

Three of the lawmakers who walked out also said they were protesting the Prime Minister Sheik Nasser Al Mohammed Al Sabah’s entire Cabinet because the portfolios were distributed on the bases of quotas for tribes and political groups, rather than “efficiency and honesty.”

The protest came less than an hour after the emir, Sheik Sabah Al Ahmed Al Sabah, urged cooperation between the two branches of government.

In what sounded like a stern warning, Sheik Sabah, who has twice used his power to dissolve the body, said he would “always intervene” to protect the country from “wrong practices.” — AP

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