{"id":5688,"date":"2023-06-08T12:26:31","date_gmt":"2023-06-08T07:26:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/?p=5688"},"modified":"2023-06-08T12:26:32","modified_gmt":"2023-06-08T07:26:32","slug":"kuwait-votes-in-opposition-led-parliament-one-woman-elected","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en\/politics\/kuwait-votes-in-opposition-led-parliament-one-woman-elected\/","title":{"rendered":"Kuwait votes in opposition-led parliament, one woman elected"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kuwait City: Opposition lawmakers won a majority in Kuwait’s parliament with only one woman elected, results showed on Wednesday, after the Gulf state’s seventh general election in just over a decade.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The opposition figures include Islamists and independent politicians not tied to the ruling family who are pushing for a raft of reforms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The vote on Tuesday came after Kuwait’s constitutional court in March annulled the results of last year’s election — in which the opposition made significant gains — and reinstated the previous parliament elected in 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Opposition lawmakers won 29 of the legislature’s 50 seats, according to results published by the official Kuwait News Agency. Only one woman was elected — opposition candidate Janan Bushehri.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The make-up of the new parliament is very similar to the one elected last year and later annulled, with all but 12 of its 50 members retaining their seats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This has sparked concerns that the legislature may once again find itself locked in disputes with the cabinet, further deepening a political crisis that has delayed reforms and hampered growth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Longtime speaker Marzouq al-Ghanim and Ahmed al-Saadoun, who replaced him last year, both returned to parliament. Saadoun is expected to run again for the post of speaker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We are celebrating today the (victory of the) reformist approach,” opposition lawmaker Adel Al-Damkhi told reporters after the results were announced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The election results are an indication of the awareness of the Kuwaiti people.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Turnout reached 50 percent one hour before polls closed, according to the Kuwait Transparency Society, an NGO. Last year’s election saw turnout of 63 percent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since Kuwait adopted a parliamentary system in 1962, the legislature has been dissolved around a dozen times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While lawmakers are elected, Kuwait’s cabinet ministers are installed by the ruling Al-Sabah family, which maintains a strong grip over political life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Continual standoffs between the branches of government have prevented lawmakers from passing economic reforms, while repeated budget deficits and low foreign investment have added to an air of gloom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking to AFP on Tuesday, Bushehri, the new parliament’s only female member, said she expected it “to seek stability and move ahead on outstanding issues, whether political or economic”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kuwait’s Emir Sheikh Nawaf al-Ahmad al-Sabah congratulated the incoming deputies and called on them to “carry the responsibility of representing the people and realize their aspiration for a better future,” according to KUNA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oil-rich Kuwait, which borders Saudi Arabia and Iraq, boasts seven percent of global crude reserves. It has little debt and one of the strongest sovereign wealth funds in the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But its lack of stability has scared off investors and dashed hopes of reform in a wealthy country struggling to diversify in similar ways to Gulf powerhouse Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kuwait City: Opposition lawmakers won a majority in Kuwait’s parliament with only one woman elected, results showed on Wednesday, after the Gulf state’s seventh general election in just over a decade. The opposition figures include Islamists and independent politicians not tied to the ruling family who are pushing for a raft of reforms. The vote […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":5689,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[396,342],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5688"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5688\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asiafreepress.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}