At the beginning of May, I wrote about the challenges surrounding Libya’s June 18 National Assembly elections. At the time, there was significant confusion over a proposed election law that would have banned political parties based on religion, ethnicity, or tribe. Since then, the National Transitional Council (NTC) has scrapped the law, but the elections could still be postponed. Last week, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, the head of the NTC, announced that the transitional government may delay the elections while some would-be candidates appeal their disqualifications in court (in February, Libya finalized a fairly complex set of eligibility laws for the National Assembly). Read more »

For years, Yemen-watchers have warned that the country is on the brink of disaster. Its wily longtime dictator, Ali Abdullah Saleh, held the country together despite civil war, a separatist rebellion in the north, complex tribal politics, and the spread of al-Qaeda. A year of unrelenting street protests and clashes between rival groups finally pushed Saleh from office in February, and his successor, President Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi, now has the unenviable task of trying to manage the unmanageable. Over the past year, an al-Qaeda affiliate called Ansar al-Shari’a has taken over territory in impoverished areas in the south of the country, forming several Taliban-style “Islamic emirates.” Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for last week’s horrific suicide bombing which killed nearly a hundred soldiers. Read more »

After months of strenuous campaigning by a myriad of candidates in Egypt’s historic presidential election, it seems that it will all just boil down to a run-off between the Muslim Brotherhood and the military. Early vote counts indicate that the two front-runners are the conservative Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohamed Morsi and Ahmed Shafiq, the Mubarak government’s last prime minister who has run on a platform of stability, unabashedly brandishing his Mubarak-era credentials and cozy relationship with the military. With the majority of the country’s 13,000 polling stations already declaring results, it appears that Morsi has won approximately 26 percent of the vote, followed by Shafiq with 24 percent. The fiery nationalist Hamdin Sabbahi seems to have placed third, but only the first two candidates will compete in a run-off election next month. Read more »

Earlier this week, as NATO leaders at the summit in Chicago pondered Afghanistan’s future, a group of worried Afghan and American women met on the sidelines to discuss strategies for protecting the fragile gains that Afghan women have achieved in the past decade. They are right to be concerned. As Western powers reduce their presence in Afghanistan over the next two years, the Taliban will undoubtedly attempt to reassert their harsh control in Kabul and the north and west of the country where women have made the most gains. Girls’ education will likely continue to be a troubling battlefield. Increased access to education for girls is one of the few bright spots since the overthrow of the Taliban. In 2001, less than 3 percent of girls attended school while today more than 40 percent do. However, Taliban attacks against girls’ schools and teachers occur with alarming frequency. Just in the past month, the Taliban poisoned hundreds of schoolgirls and several teachers in two attacks in a northern province. One attack used powder to contaminate the air in classrooms; another contaminated drinking water. Read more »

Tomorrow and Thursday, Egypt’s 50 million eligible voters will have the opportunity to make history by participating in the country’s first really contested presidential election. As I watch all the strenuous last-minute campaigning, I can’t help but wonder why any of the candidates want the job. Since the constitution has yet to be written, it’s not at all clear what powers the president will have. Moreover, the country’s economy continues to stagger, and whoever is at the helm will inevitably get the blame for deteriorating economic conditions. Read more »

Charles Landow highlights stories and reports on African agriculture, the global middle class, and the G20 economies in this week’s Missing Pieces. Enjoy the reading and the weekend.

• Africa’s Food Security: UNDP this week published the first Africa Human Development Report. The focus: food security. Overall, Africa remains “on the bottom rung” of the Human Development Index (HDI), but this may change, since “nine of the ten countries with the largest gains in HDI” over the past decade are African. The report offers extensive analysis of both the proximate causes of food insecurity and malnutrition, such as low yields and micronutrient deficiencies, and broader factors such as climate change and gender relations. Governance and inequity are crucial, too. As the last chapter argues, “interventions to strengthen food security have greater impact when women, the poor, and the vulnerable have a key role in decision-making.” Read more »

While I was visiting Saudi Arabia last week, King Abdullah fired one of the most popular Islamic leaders in the Kingdom from his government position. Sheikh Abdel Mohsen Obeikan was an advisor to the royal court until last week when, in a single line, the king ordered that the sheikh resign from his post. The reaction was swift. In newspapers, on Facebook, and on Twitter, Obeikan’s supporters and detractors speculated, gloated over, and lamented the sheikh’s inglorious fall. While it is still not clear what happened, it is safe to say that this is yet another episode in Saudi Arabia’s internal struggle to define the role of women in society. Read more »

This past weekend, I had the honor of being the commencement speaker at Effat University, a private university for women in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. It was hardly the staid affair I expected. Colorful klieg lights lit the way of arriving parents and dignitaries; forget “Pomp and Circumstance”—the more than two hundred graduates and faculty paraded in to a pulsating techno beat, while stage fog swirled to dramatic effect. The array of high-heeled shoes under the graduates’ sky-blue abayas was breathtaking—everything from six inch high, hot-pink platform wedges, to cowboy boots, to the latest snakeskin and metallic Manolo Blahniks. Read more »

This week on the blog, I’m covering developments in mobile technology. On Tuesday, I discussed an NGO’s efforts to use mobile technology to make direct cash transfers to poor families in Kenya; yesterday, I featured a guest post from Henriette Kolb, CEO of the Cherie Blair Foundation for Women, who noted how mobile innovations can help women entrepreneurs grow their businesses. Today, I’m reflecting on an interesting meeting at the Council on Foreign Relations featuring three experts on implementing mobile technology for economic growth: Ann Mei Chang, senior adviser for women and technology, Office of Global Women’s Issues at the U.S. Department of State; Alex Counts, CEO of the Grameen Foundation; and Scott C. Ratzan, vice president of global health at Johnson & Johnson. The meeting was part of our Women and Technology series sponsored by the ExxonMobil Foundation. Read more »