In the driving seat at last – Saudi Arabia’s women take to the road
TRAFFIC police in Saudi Arabia handed out pink roses to first-time female drivers yesterday, in unusual scenes for the conservative kingdom’s normally gender-segregated society. But it was far from an ordinary day. Women took to the roads after a decades-long ban was lifted, making Saudi Arabia the last country in the world to allow females to drive.
Thousands came out for their first legal drive, marking a moment that many did not think they would see in their lifetime.
Some went out at the stroke of midnight, when the law was officially overturned, and cruised along Jeddah’s seaside road. For others it was a more mundane affair of ferrying their children to school.
“I’m overwhelmed, I don’t feel like this is really happening,” Sara al-haji, 35, told The Daily Telegraph. “I get to live like a normal person now.”
“Independence Day” read the front page headline in Arab News, the leading English-language newspaper.
On social media, women posted pictures of themselves in the driver’s seat of new cars. Others sent support, using the hashtag #You_will_drive_and_ the_ People_are_with_you.
Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, a billionaire businessman who had been held in the Carlton Ritz Hotel after being swept up in the government’s anti-corruption drive, shared a video of his daughter’s first drive.
Though the overwhelming majority of Saudi Arabia’s 16 million women still do not have licences – many have not taken the gender-segregated driving courses that were first offered only a few months ago – that did not stop some, who risked a potential fine of up to £200 and drove without a licence.
“I’ve waited too long” said Asma, a nurse from Jeddah, “if I keep to the speed limit maybe they won’t see me.”
Traffic police seemed not to want to dampen the mood of the historic day by stopping cars to check identity cards.
A handful of female taxi drivers were also out taking fares.
The Daily Telegraph went out for a spin with Fadya Basmer, 23, on her first day as a “Captinah” with Careem, a ride-hailing app in the Middle East.
She earned her licence in the US three years ago but returned to Saudi Arabia in September after she heard that the ban was to be overturned.
A young girl on the street saw her in the driver’s seat, and could not believe her eyes. She and her father threw Miss Basmer a smile and a wave.
“Being a taxi driver for me is about inspiring girls to do what men do,” she said. “Nothing less.”
The lifting of the ban – the most visible symbol of women’s repression in Saudi Arabia – will be a life-changing experience for many, freeing them
‘I don’t feel like this is really happening. I get to live like a normal person now’
from dependence on male chauffeurs.
An estimated six million – or 65 per cent of the female driving-age population – are expected to apply for a licence, according to the London-based consulting firm Facts Global Energy. But others said they were in no rush. “After a lifetime of having a chauffeur, I can’t imagine life without one,” said Joumana, a professor at King Abdulaziz University. “I believe it’s the right of every human to drive and I want to have the ability to make such a basic decision, but I don’t necessarily want to practise it,” she said.
The only women seen behind the wheel in Saudi Arabia were female American soldiers driving jeeps during the first Gulf War in 1990, the sight of which prompted protests by activists demanding the same right. It would be 28 years before their demands would be met, though Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman made sure they were not out to claim any credit.
Three of the women in that 1990 demonstration were arrested last month in an unprecedented crackdown on women’s rights activists.