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Lebanon celebrates 74th years of complete marginalization of its female component
23-11-2017
After 74 years of the country’s independence, which it celebrated yesterday, no woman to date has lit up the Lebanese public domain, irrespective of the ratification in 1953 of women’s right to vote. Men still far outnumber their female counterparts who are almost completely marginalized in representation. This marginalization was noticeable in the First Lady, Nadia Chammy Aoun’s speech on the Independence Day in which she stressed the need to revive Lebanon’s past standing as the “Switzerland of the Middle East”, but totally overlooked the fact that Lebanon’s women are still deprived of their basic rights at all walks of life. On the occasion of Independence, Al Akhbar newspaper published an article entitled, “Behind all the heroes of independence, there is a hidden identity of a subordinate woman.” In its feature, Al Akhbar wrote that notwithstanding the 1953 right of women to vote, this right remains incomplete. Female’s political participation is still shy or sidelined, whether in terms of representation or engagement in political parties, the newspaper wrote, sarcastically stating that since the “resurrection of Lebanon’s so-termed ‘independence, this participation saw only 10 female MPs and 8 ministers. Al Akhbar considered that the mobilization of women through NGOs and their increased involvement in civil society is but a Western style attempt to conceal their political banishment after failing to secure the 30% women quota. Long years after the independence of Lebanon, the country has fallen to the 181th place among 193 states according to the 2016 Women in Parliament indicator for 2016. The Lebanese house of legislatives today has only 4 women MPs (representing only 3% of seats), Al Akhbar said. Women, specifically politicians, although few, have arrived because they are either sisters or daughters or relatives of men, Al Akhbar concluded, asking “When does the Lebanese woman get her independence form political male chauvinism or masculinity?” The article appears on the following link: https://www.al-akhbar.com/node/286818. (Al Akhbar, L’Orient Le Jour, November 22, 2017)
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- العربية
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