Another landmark! Saudi woman starts working at a gas station
KHOBAR (SAUDI ARABIA) — Mervat Bukhari becomes the first Saudi woman to work at a gas station, something unimaginable not long ago.
The kingdom is in the midst of reforms that mark the biggest cultural shake-up in its modern history.
Kickstarted by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the reforms include the historic decision allowing women to drive from June, attend soccer games and take on jobs that once fell outside the narrow confines of traditional gender roles.
When Bukhari, 43 and a mother of four, was promoted as supervisor of a gas station in eastern Khobar city last October, insults began pouring in on social media with the hashtag “Saudi women don’t work at gas stations”.
Bukhari, previously employed in a junior role by the same parent company, was forced to go on the defensive, telling critics she was in a managerial position and not physically handling fuel nozzles.
“I am a supervisor. I don’t fill gas myself,” she reasoned.
“Women today have the right to do any work.”
Prince Mohammed’s Vision 2030 reform plan for a post-oil era seeks to elevate women to nearly one-third of the workforce, up from about 22 per cent now.
Government statistics also put more than one million Saudi wom- en as currently looking to enter the workforce. The reforms have seen the Saudi labour market slowly open up to women, introducing them to jobs that were once firmly the preserve of men.
The social change has introduced a series of firsts.
Saudi media has championed in recent months the first woman restaurant chef, first woman veterinarian and even the first woman tour guide.
But women face sobering realities — despite often being better qualified than men.
“Saudi women are better educated, but less mobile, less employed and vastly underpaid,” Karen Young, a scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, said.
Average monthly salaries in the private sector are close to 8,000 Saudi riyals ($2,134, 1,748 euros) for men, and only 5,000 riyals for women, according to research firm Jadwa.
The decision to allow women to drive after a decades-long ban could give women the much-needed mobility to join the workforce. For the first time, women are seen alongside men in jazz music concerts and in mixed-gender restaurants.
“The well-known expression: ‘You are a woman, cover your face’ seems to be disappearing from our society,” human rights lawyer Abdulrahman Al Lahim wrote recently in the pro-government Okaz newspaper. Authorities appear to be slowly dismantling the many injustices against women ingrained in the law.
Saudi women now no longer need male permission to start business.
Saudi Arabia also recently annulled the “house of obedience” article in the marriage law, which grants a husband the right to summon his wife to his home against her will. The reform introduces a novel concept in married life: mutual consent.
“This is not a revolution, this is evolution,” Hoda Al Helaissi, a member of the advisory Shura Council, said, referring to newfound social liberties.
“It’s a rite of passage for women.”
Back at Bukhari’s home in neighbouring Dammam city, she embraced her youngest son Mohammed — who stood by her even as her brothers decried her gas station job as a shocking breach of tradition.
But the 16-year-old prefers to hide his mother’s job from his peers, hoping to protect her from even more insults.
“Maybe five years from now it will be normal to see women at gas stations,” he said, kissing his mother’s hand. —