News from our ally Saudi Arabia: another woman nabbed for driving a horseless carriage.
Saudi police on Saturday pulled over a woman minutes after she got behind the wheel in the Red Sea city of Jeddah after activists called for a new challenge to a driving ban.
“Only 10 minutes after Tamador al-Yami got behind the wheel police stopped her,” activist Eman al-Nafjan told AFP, adding that Yami carries an international driving licence and was with another woman who was filming her in the car.
Tamador’s husband was called to the scene and she was forced to sign a pledge not to drive again without a Saudi licence, said Nafjan on her Twitter account.
Has it all – surveillance, imposition of male “guardian” on adult woman, coercion to sign a pledge, and the insulting “without a Saudi licence” when women can’t get a Saudi licence.
The absolute monarchy is the only country in the world where women are barred from driving, a rule that has drawn international condemnation.
Why condemnation? Because women are human beings too; adult human beings with the necessary cognitive development to drive cars. That’s why.