Afghan elections: Record number of women stand for parliament

[Turborama]

Source: The Guardian

Despite everyday prejudice and Taliban death threats a record number of female candidates are standing in September polls -

Jon Boone in Kabul -

A record number of women are running in Afghanistan's critical parliamentary elections next month despite many being inundated with threatening phone calls, including death threats from insurgents.

Amid ever-rising violence, which some people fear could foster a repeat of last year's catastrophic presidential election, women are struggling to campaign at all outside a few areas, poll monitors say.

Even in Kabul, the capital, where the Guardian has interviewed a number of female candidates, women say they are facing daily obstruction from conservative hardliners.

With voting billed for 18 September, Kabul's streets have been plastered in posters and billboards, many of which show the faces of would-be female MPs in the capital, the number of whom has more than doubled since 2005. However, many of the posters do not stay up long, or get defaced with slashes of bright red ink. "I've told my team that we just have to expect this sort of thing," said Fareda Tarana, who had just been told another batch of her expensive posters had been torn down on Kabul's busy airport road.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/24/record-women-candidates-afghan-election

---

More details and candidate profiles at the link.


Election posters line a street in Jalalabad, east of Kabul,
Afghanistan Photograph: Rahmat Gul/AP

[renate]

1. brave women

They must be such incredible people... like abolitionists and early civil-rights workers here who also risked their lives. I can't say enough about how much I admire them.

[Turborama]

2. 406 of them running for at least 64 seats

I admire them for their bravery and courage, too. It's good that the number has increased but it's a shame only a 1/4 of the seats "reserved for women" (whatever that means) would be filled even if they all won.

Despite the dangers the number of women seeking representation in parliament has risen sharply, from 328 in 2005 to 406 across Afghanistan, according to an international election monitor in Kabul. They are running for at least 64 of the 249 seats reserved for women.