Middle East8217;s unseen politicians

The three candidates live in West Asian countries 8212; Qatar, Yemen and Iran 8212; where women not only can vote, but can play a role in government. Yet they must do so under conditions western women would find undemocratically restrictive.

8220;We live in a very conservative society8230; we have to play by the rules,8221; said Wadha al-Suwaidi, the head of Qatar University8217;s teaching college and the candidate who refused to show her face during recent Qatari municipal elections.

Some Islamic scholars see no contradiction in the imposition of the veil and the extension of electoral rights. They maintain that Islam has always given women rights andthat the veil is a privilege, because it frees women from unwanted male attention.

Other observers see a real attempt by Islamic societies to adapt to the modern world, allowing certain freedoms while retaining traditional values symbolised by dress codes.

But sceptics say the veils reveal insincerity. States that are at heart anti-democratic keep their women cloaked and allow them to vote only to gain international acceptance and perhaps money from agencies that make aid conditional on reforms and women8217;S Rights, the critics say.

8220;They can use the jargon of democratisation and election as a way to legitimise themselves, appear to be modern and counter the claims of authoritarianism,8221; said Shiva Balaghi, associate director of the Centre for Middle Eastern Studies at New York University.

Such academic arguments seem of little interest to the women wearing veils and casting votes in West Asia. Yemeni women, for instance, are more concerned with issues like jobs and illiteracy.

Yemen, with apopulation of 16 million, is by far the Arabian peninsula8217;s most democratic country, and women there, almost all of whom wear veils, have traditionally had a role in public life.

Rauffa Hassan al-Sharki, director of the Women Studies programme at Sana University, says the veil is part of Yemeni tradition.

Modernisation does not mean local customs 8220;should vanish,8221; she said. Yemeni women wear veils as a result of tradition and social pressures.

Women make up 28 per cent of Yemeni first-year college students, but the percentage drops in later years either because women leave to marry or are forced to quit by parents who accuse them of having relationships with male classmates.

From beneath the long and constraining garments Iran8217;s constitution requires, Iranian women are showing a growing determination to moderate the hard-line policies and strict social guidelines put in place by the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, father of the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

8220;We are trying to give women their fullIslamic rights,8221; said Suheila Jelowdarzadeh, who campaigned and won in cloak and scarf in 1996 national elections and now is one of 13 women in the 270-member parliament.