Saudi Arabia’s stock exchange has appointed a woman to the position of chairperson for the first time in the kingdom’s history, sparking hopes that the country is progressing—albeit slowly—towards gender equality. Sarah Al Suhaimi, who became the first female chief executive of a Saudi investment bank when she took the role at NBC Capital in 2014, accepted the offer to chair Saudi Arabia’s Tadawul, the largest bourse in the Middle East, replacing Khalid Al Rabiah, the organisation said in a statement last week. The announcement was followed by Monday’s appointment of Rania Mahmoud Nashar to the position of chief executive of Samba Financial Group, one of the country’s largest national banks. Ms Nashar has nearly two decades of experience in the financial sector and previously held several jobs at within Samba, according to Bloomberg. The appointment of women at top financial jobs is an important step for the Saudi Arabia,…

Xhosa Prince Xhanti Sigcawu has recently supported his brother King Mphendulo’s stance that former AU commission chairperson Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma may be too “delicate” to lead the country. In an interview with News24, Sigcawu said he agreed with King Mphendulo Sigcawu that the country might not be ready for a woman president. “The King said he wonders, with women’s vulnerability, will she be able to handle the role? Men have been struggling with the job. It’s a question that we need to ask. This was not directed purely at Dlamini-Zuma, it’s to all women.” When Dlamini Zuma visited Sigcawu’s Nqadu great place near Willowvale recently, The Daily Dispatch reported that Sigcawu told Dlamini-Zuma that the country was not ready for a woman president. “He said that women are delicate. We need to make sure that we made a good decision so that we don’t regret it tomorrow. He doesn’t say…

By Yao peng/ Jane Wang In recent days, a company in central China’s Hubei Province officially established its own women’s federation, marking the first time that such a corporation has done so in the local region, China Women’s News reports. Accordingly, there are around 1,000 staff members in the Hubei Shiyan Aiyingbeimei Trading Company, with female staff members accounting for more than 95 percent. Since its establishment seven years ago, the company has shown a great passion for supporting the local area’s public-welfare events and promoting women and children’s development in the region. After learning of the company’s intention to set up its own women’s federation, the Shiyan Women’s Federation organized a special committee to offer professional guidance and suggestions to help with the initial work. Over the past few years, the women’s federations at all levels in the city of Shiyan have contributed great efforts to advancing and perfecting…

By: Anneliese Mahoney Melinda Gates is dedicating herself to ensuring that women, globally, have access to contraception and reproductive health care. In a recent op-ed penned for National Geographic, the famed philanthropist pledged that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation would help 120 million more women gain access to birth control by 2020. Gates described her motivations for taking on this task, saying: “In the decade and a half since Bill and I started our foundation, I’ve heard from women all over the world about how important contraceptives are to their ability to take charge of their futures. When women are able to plan their pregnancies around their goals for themselves and their families, they are also better able to finish their education, earn an income, and fully participate in their communities”. While this initiative has been underway for a few years, Gates’ letter shows a renewed commitment to the…

Princess Reema bint Bandar The conservative Islamic country has maintained a ban on women participating in competitive sports but has now relaxed rules on them going to the gym for health reasons, local paper Okaz has reported. Princess Reema bint Bandar said that the Islamic Kingdom planned for every district and neighbourhood to have a gym. Although swimming, running and bodybuilding will be allowed, a blanket ban will remain for competitive sports like tennis, football, volleyball and basketball. Princess Reema told the paper ‘It is not my role to convince the society, but my role is limited to opening the doors for our girls to live a healthy lifestyle away from diseases that result from obesity and lack of movement.’ Women-only gym NuYu has already opened in the more liberal city Jeddah, capital Riyadh, Dammam and al-Khobar. The General Authority of Sports has said the high-cost of running female gyms…

By: Anna MacSwan Getting men to be active fathers may not seem the most obvious way to tackle gender-based violence. But, according to Gary Barker, CEO and founder of Promundo, who engages men and boys in ending violence against women and girls, policies that encourage men to do more unpaid care work are a vital part of achieving gender equality. “To us, it seemed obvious that we needed to figure out more constructive ways to engage men on this topic,” he says. In fact, there can be consequences when men aren’t brought into initiatives to empower women. According to Barker, while in the long-term, women who are better off financially are less likely to be involved in a violent relationship and more likely to leave a violent partner, in the short-term, the opposite can be true. Micro-credit programmes that target women, for example, can initially lead to an increase in…

By: Tod Perry Women in Saudi Arabia are standing up in opposition to the kingdom’s $3.5 billion investment in Uber. Saudi Arabia is the only country in the world that bans women from driving and the investment is seen as a way for the country and Uber to profit from oppression. To travel freely, women in the conservative Islamic country are forced to either be driven by a male family member or pay for services such as Uber. “They’re investing in our pain, in our suffering,” Hatoon al-Fassi, a Saudi women’s historian who teaches at Qatar University, said. “This institutionalizes women’s inferiority and dependency, and it turns women into an object of investment.” Women in Saudi Arabia who are caught behind the wheel are subject fines and, in some cases, flogging. To protest Uber’s partnership with the kingdom, Saudi women have posted pictures of themselves deleting the Uber app…