Progress Amid Resistance

90 WOMEN’S RIGHTS IN THE MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICAhe took office. The president’s term has been renewed every six years. 1Until recently, citizens could only vote for or against a single nominee ina referendum. However, an amendment to Article 76 of the constitutionin 2005 allowed for the nomination of alternative candidates. 2 While thisrepresented a step toward democratic competition, it was accompaniedby other amendments that, according to the opposition, inhibit politicalparties’ ability to contest the hegemony of the ruling National DemocraticParty. And any improvements to the electoral framework continue to beovershadowed by the government’s use of authoritarian tactics in practice. 3In this deeply contested environment, Egyptians have engaged in ahigh level of political activism on several fronts. To contest Mubarak’s bidfor a fifth presidential term and the possibility that he would “bequeath”the office to his son, Gamal Mubarak, a movement of mostly urban,professional women and men known as Kefaya (Enough) staged its firstprotest in December 2004. Since then the group has led several demonstrationsin Cairo and across the country to demand genuine politicalre form. On another front, female students, mostly belonging to variousIslamist movements, have been exceptionally active in student oppositionto the encroachment of security forces on their rights and space in theuni versities. Women and men of all political stripes also took to the streetsin large numbers following the Israeli assault on Gaza in January 2009.Moreover, factory workers and civil servants have instigated a number ofstrikes and demonstrations, in which women have played a leading role,calling upon the government to address the problem of corruption and thefailure to provide wages that meet the rising cost of living. Protests relatedto gender-specific issues have been less common, although female activistshave protested against women’s molestation on the street.The years 2004–09 featured continued progress in the removal of genderinequality from the Egyptian legal system. One of the main demandsof women’s rights groups was finally met in 2004, when the governmentsubmitted proposed changes to the nationality law that would enableEgyptian women married to foreign men to pass on their nationality totheir children. The new law was approved by the legislature, and it hashelped to secure the rights of children whose mothers had non-Egyptianspouses. Two major reforms took place in 2008. First, the Supreme JudicialCouncil allowed women to become judges and sit on the bench for thefirst time in the country’s history. Second, amendments to the child law