The Los Angeles Times printed this interview with Manal al-Sharif by Emily Alpert. A link to it is here, and text below.
Manal Sharif has been jailed, insulted and
threatened. Her enemies faked her death, in a hamhanded bid to make an
example of her. This year, she says, she was forced out of her job. Her
life has been turned upside down by a crime that isn’t even a crime --
driving in her country, Saudi Arabia.
"There’s a famous saying in Arabic: When you oppress people, you make
them heroes," she said. "I couldn’t understand why I was in jail. But
that’s what created all this."
Driving isn’t actually illegal for women in Saudi Arabia, as Sharif
is quick to point out. But because Muslim clerics have declared it
forbidden, the traffic department refuses to grant women licenses.
Sharif is among a group of women who have contested the ban.
Last year, after millions of people viewed an online video of
her driving, Sharif was detained twice by police who insisted that she
stop and demanded to know who was behind the campaign. She was released
after an outcry but continued to face death threats and other attacks.
The furor also made her famous, feted as one of the most influential
people in the world by Time magazine and awarded a prize in Oslo for
"creative dissent" -- a prize that ultimately cost Sharif her job when
her employer told her she couldn’t leave the country to accept it, she
said.
She did anyway, leaving her jobless after her trip to Europe this
spring. But there is plenty for Sharif to do: The campaign that began as
a plea to allow women to drive has expanded to contest all kinds of
sexism in Saudi Arabia, where women must obtain permission from men to
work, travel or study.
Activists are pushing for women to drive again Friday; an earlier driving protest was
delayed after the death of the Saudi crown prince. The Times talked to
Sharif about her quest in the year since she and her fellow activists
urged Saudi women to get behind the wheel.
Why do you think driving has been so sensitive in Saudi Arabia, even more so than women voting?
There are people who will fight back because it's a financial loss
for them. If you want to get a driver, you have to go to an office and
give them money to bring you a driver from India or Indonesia. It's a
business for them. We’ve been told they get 800 million riyals every
year. So businessmen will do all kinds of campaigns to discredit us and
say bad things about us. It's like a war.
Then there are the religious people. If they lose their grip on
controlling women, they lose the grip on the whole society. We believe
these smaller subjects are used to make people not discuss the more
important thing, which is the male guardianship system for women. Being
treated as a second-class citizen. All of this is the tip of the
iceberg. There are children, 10 years old, and they drive because their
moms or sisters cannot drive! A woman has to have her driver go with her
to the office, go home, come pick her up, go home. This means more
crowded streets and more pollution.
Do women defy the ban in their daily lives?
Sometimes it's really urgent and a woman has to drive, like the kid
is dying. But usually the women do not know how. It's a very foreign
act. My friend, her dad died in front of her waiting for the ambulance
because she couldn’t drive. She said, "If I could drive I would have
saved my father." Even if a woman wants to do it and knows how, your
neighbors see you driving and call the religious police.
What has happened since the protests last year?
We’ve been talking to officials, writing articles, campaigning,
trying to teach women to drive. I filed the first lawsuit against the
traffic police for not issuing me a license. We believe the driving
campaign rocked the boat. People talk about it now. The taboo has
opened. There’s also been so much international attention.
I never understood it, why people are so interested in women driving.
But when I met Kathryn Cameron Porter, president of the Leadership
Council for Human Rights, in the United States, she said, "Manal, you
find women who didn’t care because we take everything for granted, and
when they see this, they say, 'What? This woman can’t drive because
she’s a woman?'" It is the power of a single story.
Now anywhere you go, if they know one thing about Saudi Arabia, they
know women cannot drive there. That means the government will be
pressured to do something.
Do you believe this will change soon?
I believe if women want to change their reality, it will change. If
women are silent, I don’t think anything will change. Rights are never
given. Rights are taken.
We’re also hoping for some new and young blood (in the Saudi
government). Sixty percent of us in this country are under 25, but the
people in power are double our age. This creates a huge gap between us.
Manal al Sharif: trying to keep the fight for women's rights alive.
In the past year, they have lost jobs, friends, social standing,
reputations and they have been imprisoned, shunned and – in a few cases
– even received death threats.
But women in Saudi Arabia were this weekend preparing once again to risk arrest and even flogging to drive cars in defiance of the country's ban.
It was on 17 June last year that about 100 women took part in the first demonstration organised by underground civil disobedience campaigns Women2Drive and I Will Drive My Own Car.
Many were arrested and jailed. One woman's sentence of 10 lashes was revoked only after the king intervened. It was the largest mass action since November 1990, when 47 Saudi women were arrested after demonstrating in cars.
On Wednesday, two founders of the movement, Manal al-Sharif, 33, and Najla Hariri, 45, posted an open letter with 600 signatories to King Abdullah, appealing once more for an end to the ban on women driving. The letter said: "Our initiative is not aimed at violating laws."
On Sunday, women with international driving licences are being urged to flout the ban, but to make sure they do it respectfully, wearing the legally required full Islamic dress and displaying a picture of the king.
Campaigners want men to show their support by travelling in the passenger seat with their wives, mothers, and sisters. They are also asking women to flood the traffic department with driving licence applications.
"We only want to enjoy the right to drive like all women over the world," Hariri told the Observer. "It is really hard for women to take such a stand for the right of driving," she said. "But they will do so because we are really in need of this. So many women are struggling to manage their lives without the right to drive, it is not easy."
It was in May 2011 that Hariri, fed up with having to find a male relative to ferry her and her children around, began to drive herself. After hearing about Hariri driving on Facebook, al-Sharif, a divorced mother, followed suit a few days later, posting a video of herself on YouTube. Al-Sharif was imprisoned by the religious police for more than a week.
This month, Al-Sharif was unable to join four other Arab women in Washington to receive a Vital Voices Leadership Award from an organisation founded by Hillary Clinton.
"The main reason for not being at the awards was [concern] for my family's safety after receiving death threats from insane people," al-Sharif tweeted.
A year after she won recognition for defying the ban, al-Sharif has been forced to resign from her job at Saudi's government-owned Aramco oil company and has lost her housing. Family members have left the country out of fears for their safety.
In the past, King Abdullah, 87, has been quoted as saying "the day will come" when women are allowed to drive. Since last year's campaign, he has promised to allow women to vote and to stand in certain elections by 2015.
But many are sceptical that the king's announcement will herald a move towards equality in a society where discrimination remains entrenched – Saudi Arabia has come under attack for not allowing women athletes to participate in the London Olympics, although the governing Olympic body, the IOC, has refused calls to impose sanctions.
"A lot of westerners don't realise that the king and the government are a lot more progressive than the people," said Saudi writer Lubna Hussein.
"They have to walk a tightrope because the people may want to be modern but they don't want to be western. This year's driving campaign is much more subdued than last year's because of apathy."
She added: "It's no coincidence that during the Arab spring Saudi's neighbours were on fire, but it didn't reach the kingdom. People are comfortable and it makes them numb. With every change, there is often an economic imperative, then change happens fast.
"In Saudi, everything runs smoothly. The drive ban is indefensible, ridiculous, but there is enough of a backlash from the population against the protests to keep it [the ban] in place."
Saudi Arabia's powerful religious body, the Shura Council, has widely publicised an academic study that claims allowing women to drive would lead to higher rates of divorce, prostitution and drug abuse.
Meanwhile, a campaign called My Guardian Knows What is Best for Me – which opposes calls for a more liberal approach to women's rights, including women driving – has been started by a group of Saudi women.
That means the high personal price that is being paid by Hariri, al-Sharif and other women could be for nothing if the apathy Hussein refers to stops women driving in Saudi.
"I am very happy with the attention that we draw to our right to drive and I thank God that so many men are supporting us," said Hariri. "I can't say women are afraid, but of course they are worried – worried equally about the police and about their families.
"I hope that June 17 this year will bring us some good news regarding driving, because society's awareness is so much better now and there is wider understanding that there is an alternative here," she said.
"All of us have the dream that our country can and will become a supportive community for women, where men and women are treated equally."
But women in Saudi Arabia were this weekend preparing once again to risk arrest and even flogging to drive cars in defiance of the country's ban.
It was on 17 June last year that about 100 women took part in the first demonstration organised by underground civil disobedience campaigns Women2Drive and I Will Drive My Own Car.
Many were arrested and jailed. One woman's sentence of 10 lashes was revoked only after the king intervened. It was the largest mass action since November 1990, when 47 Saudi women were arrested after demonstrating in cars.
On Wednesday, two founders of the movement, Manal al-Sharif, 33, and Najla Hariri, 45, posted an open letter with 600 signatories to King Abdullah, appealing once more for an end to the ban on women driving. The letter said: "Our initiative is not aimed at violating laws."
On Sunday, women with international driving licences are being urged to flout the ban, but to make sure they do it respectfully, wearing the legally required full Islamic dress and displaying a picture of the king.
Campaigners want men to show their support by travelling in the passenger seat with their wives, mothers, and sisters. They are also asking women to flood the traffic department with driving licence applications.
"We only want to enjoy the right to drive like all women over the world," Hariri told the Observer. "It is really hard for women to take such a stand for the right of driving," she said. "But they will do so because we are really in need of this. So many women are struggling to manage their lives without the right to drive, it is not easy."
It was in May 2011 that Hariri, fed up with having to find a male relative to ferry her and her children around, began to drive herself. After hearing about Hariri driving on Facebook, al-Sharif, a divorced mother, followed suit a few days later, posting a video of herself on YouTube. Al-Sharif was imprisoned by the religious police for more than a week.
This month, Al-Sharif was unable to join four other Arab women in Washington to receive a Vital Voices Leadership Award from an organisation founded by Hillary Clinton.
"The main reason for not being at the awards was [concern] for my family's safety after receiving death threats from insane people," al-Sharif tweeted.
A year after she won recognition for defying the ban, al-Sharif has been forced to resign from her job at Saudi's government-owned Aramco oil company and has lost her housing. Family members have left the country out of fears for their safety.
In the past, King Abdullah, 87, has been quoted as saying "the day will come" when women are allowed to drive. Since last year's campaign, he has promised to allow women to vote and to stand in certain elections by 2015.
But many are sceptical that the king's announcement will herald a move towards equality in a society where discrimination remains entrenched – Saudi Arabia has come under attack for not allowing women athletes to participate in the London Olympics, although the governing Olympic body, the IOC, has refused calls to impose sanctions.
"A lot of westerners don't realise that the king and the government are a lot more progressive than the people," said Saudi writer Lubna Hussein.
"They have to walk a tightrope because the people may want to be modern but they don't want to be western. This year's driving campaign is much more subdued than last year's because of apathy."
She added: "It's no coincidence that during the Arab spring Saudi's neighbours were on fire, but it didn't reach the kingdom. People are comfortable and it makes them numb. With every change, there is often an economic imperative, then change happens fast.
"In Saudi, everything runs smoothly. The drive ban is indefensible, ridiculous, but there is enough of a backlash from the population against the protests to keep it [the ban] in place."
Saudi Arabia's powerful religious body, the Shura Council, has widely publicised an academic study that claims allowing women to drive would lead to higher rates of divorce, prostitution and drug abuse.
Meanwhile, a campaign called My Guardian Knows What is Best for Me – which opposes calls for a more liberal approach to women's rights, including women driving – has been started by a group of Saudi women.
That means the high personal price that is being paid by Hariri, al-Sharif and other women could be for nothing if the apathy Hussein refers to stops women driving in Saudi.
"I am very happy with the attention that we draw to our right to drive and I thank God that so many men are supporting us," said Hariri. "I can't say women are afraid, but of course they are worried – worried equally about the police and about their families.
"I hope that June 17 this year will bring us some good news regarding driving, because society's awareness is so much better now and there is wider understanding that there is an alternative here," she said.
"All of us have the dream that our country can and will become a supportive community for women, where men and women are treated equally."
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