Saudi Arabian Women Will Be Allowed To Vote, Run in Elections

Well, they aren’t allowed to drive yet or leave the country without a male chaperone, but Saudi Arabian women will finally get some suffrage, after decades of external pressure from rights groups.

Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah announced Sunday that women will be given the right to vote and run in municipal elections, according to the BBC. The country, which enforces strict conservative Islamic law, has long prevented female citizens from many rights enjoyed by men.

“Because we refuse to marginalize women in society in all roles that comply with sharia, we have decided, after deliberation with our senior clerics and others … to involve women in the Shura Council as members, starting from next term,” Abdullah said, according to the BBC.  “Women will be able to run as candidates in the municipal election and will even have the right to vote.”

As Saudi authorities have watched conservative and oppressive regimes fall or be challenged by uprisings around the Middle East this year, pressure from outside rights groups has been accompanied by building pressure from within the country. In June, women staged peaceful protests by driving themselves around the country and taking video—an act technically not illegal but very dangerous in a place where females are far less empowered than men and could suffer harsh punishment under Islamic law.

According to the BBC, King Abdullah has carefully pushed for reform in the country—a difficult task in a place where the rules are defined by conservative clerics and members of the royal family who are resistant to change.

Activists and reform advocates welcomed the announcement and said they would press forward on other reforms, which they have been working on for decades.

“This is something we have long waited for and worked towards,” Saudi writer Nimah Ismail told the BBC.