Even though Egypt has guaranteed that out of 508 parliamentary seats, 64 of them would be for women and that in terms of the process of women's rights, i think that this a positive but small development in the Egyptian's government part. I still cant help but to feel sceptical about this issue because Egypt is a country where political expression is limited. Firstly, potential candidates must meet strict criteria in order to participate in the elections process and secondly,the strongest challenger to the ruling government is the Muslim Brotherhood which is tolerated but officially banned by the authority.
When freedom of political expression is not there in the first place, or like what Gamila Ismail, an independent, has pointed out, when the electoral process is not transparent, I start to question what really motivated the government to do so and the political context in which it was taken in. The government could be like what Gamila Ismail said, that it wants to boost its image abroad by using the increase in women participation in election as a tool.
If the government is really trying to address the longstanding under-representation of women and bring Egypt in line with levels of female parliamentary participation elsewhere in the Arab world and boost its image, then why should it has only 64 out of 508 seats reserved for women. My sentiments are the same as The Egyptian Centre for Women's Rights, non-government organisation, that the proportion is too low. I feel that the seats should be freely contested and there would be no quotas regardless of gender if the government really appeared to be that open-minded.
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