Four women contest for QCCI board

Qatari businesswomen now want an increasing share in decision-making in the representative body of the private sector—the Qatar Chamber of Commerce and Industry (QCCI).

Election to the Chamber’s Board of Directors is due on May 16 and four women have entered the fray to challenge men in a body that remains almost entirely dominated by them.

One of the contestants, Ibtehag Al Ahmedani, is a sitting (and lone woman) member of the Chamber’s Board and is seeking re-election.

The other three are new to the Chamber’s electoral politics and they are Mona Al Sulaiti, Alanood Khamis Khalid Al Rubban and Buthain Hasan Al Ansari.

Asked by The Peninsula to comment on the increasing presence of women in the Chamber’s poll race, Al Ahmedani said: “I will speak up only after the election.”

She is part of a 17-member panel the sitting and influential QCCI chairman, Sheikh Khalifa bin Jassem Al Thani, has put up for the May 16 poll. Most panellists are sitting QCCI directors.

The three other women contestants are in a five-member panel put up by a young and budding businessman, Yusuf Al Kuwari, who is challenging the might of stalwarts led by Sheikh Khalifa in the coveted poll in which voters are permitted to appoint nominees to cast ballot on their behalf.

Al Kuwari says he is confident he and his panel members would make it to the Chamber as they are fresh faces and fighting on a progressive manifesto.

The QCCI poll committee on Thursday finalised a list of 24 contestants for election to the QCCI Board.

Two of the 24 candidates have already been declared elected as there were no challengers to their nomination and they were Sheikh Khalifa himself and another sitting board member, Mohammed bin Ahmed Tawar Al Kuwari.

Sheikh Khalifa represents the insurance sector while Al Kuwari is from agriculture. Both these sectors have a seat each in the QCCI Board.

Insurance is the latest addition taking the total number of sectors represented in the QCCI Board to eight. Trading and contracting sectors have five and four seats respectively, while the industrial sector has three seats and services; banking and tourism have one each.

Al Ahmedani is from the trading sector, while Mona Sulaiti represents services, Buthain Al Ansari contracting and Alanood Al Rubban is from the trading sector.

The poll panel rejected nomination papers of three applicants as they failed to fulfil requirements by Thursday which was the last day for receiving nominations.

QCCI members elect a new board every four years and the May 16 election will be the fourth since the maiden poll was held in 1998.