This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 SANAA 003603 
 
SIPDIS 
 
NEA FOR DAS CARPENTER 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL KDEM KMPI KWMN YM DEMOCRATIC REFORM
SUBJECT: MEPI IN ACTION: YEMENI WOMEN PUT CAMPAIGN SKILLS 
TO GOOD USE 
 
REF: A. SANAA 3572 
     ¶B. SANAA 3558 
 
¶1.  Summary:  During a December 26 meeting with female 
representatives from Yemen's major political parties, 
General People's Congress (GPC) member Fatima Khatari shared 
the secrets to her recent successful campaign for the party's 
General Committee.  Khatari explained to the group, who meet 
regularly through a Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) 
program, how she and her campaign manager/sister Khadija 
utilized campaign skills 
taught by the National Democratic Institute (NDI) to lobby 
party members for support and secure a coveted seat on the 
party's highest committee.  The Khatari sisters expressed 
their appreciation for USG support, saying success would have 
been impossible without the campaign training provided by 
NDI. End Summary. 
 
------------------------------------- 
Women's Network:  Strength in Numbers 
------------------------------------- 
 
¶2.  With the help of a $695,000 MEPI grant, NDI is working 
with representatives from Yemen's four largest political 
parties to increase women's political participation.  As 
part of that effort, NDI established the Women's Network, in 
which representatives from the ruling GPC, along with 
opposition parties Islah, Yemen Socialist Party (YSP) and 
the Nasserite Unionist Party, meet regularly to discuss ways 
to strengthen the role of women within parties and advance 
women's issues nationally as a coalition.  Some of the 
Network's activities include developing a lobbying strategy 
to encourage party leadership to adopt a quota for female 
candidates in the 2006 local council elections and 
discussing ways to increase female registration and turn-out 
in targeted districts.  To support the activities the Network 
agrees on, NDI provides training on conflict resolution, 
negotiation, strategic planning, and campaign tactics. 
 
----------------------------------------- 
On the Campaign Trail: A Winning Strategy 
----------------------------------------- 
 
¶3.  During a December 26 Network meeting, the Khatari sisters 
shared with the group how they successfully employed the 
campaign tactics taught by NDI (along with some of their own 
special adaptations) to win Fatima a seat on the GPC's 
highest committee, the General Committee.  At the seventh GPC 
party conference held December 15-18 (ref A), party members 
voted to fill 25 open seats on the 38-person committee.  The 
party leadership reserved four of the seats for female 
candidates, following through on a previous commitment to 
implement a 15 percent quota for female representation (ref 
B).  Without the quota, the 
sisters said neither one of them stood any chance against a 
male candidate.  "With the quota, we decided one of us must 
run," Fatima told the group. 
 
¶4.  They decided to canvass party members to determine which 
sister already had more name recognition.  Both sisters are 
active GPC members.  Fatima works in the Women's Affairs and 
Local Council divisions for the national party.  Khadija is 
Activities Director for the GPC,s Sanaa branch.  After 
canvassing, they decided that Fatima would be the candidate 
and Khadija would be the campaign manager. 
 
¶5.  "I really benefited from the (NDI) workshop on leading a 
campaign," explained Khadija, who developed the campaign 
strategy.  First, Khadija created a brightly colored flyer 
with a "short and clear message" to distribute to voters. She 
also worked with Fatima to practice responses on why she 
would be a good committee member. 
 
¶6.  With a platform and campaign literature in hand, the 
sisters split duties on lobbying party members.  The sisters 
believed the best way to gain support was to focus on 
influential and well-respected party members whose 
endorsement would in turn generate votes from the 
rank-and-file.  Fatima focused on getting votes from female 
party members, starting with the heads of the women's 
committees in all of the governorates and district party 
organizations. 
 
¶7.  Khadija took on the harder task of convincing men to 
support Fatima.  Like her sister, she started with the most 
prominent and well-respected party members.  Khadija also 
convinced Fatima's husband to call voters from his home 
governorate of Haja, urging them to support his wife. During 
the actual conference, she made sure every voting member 
received one of the brightly colored flyers, including the 
most powerful party member of all, President Saleh.  Khadija 
proudly explained to the group that when she was called to 
cast her own vote for the General Committee, she confidently 
placed a "Vote Fatima" flyer 
directly into the hands of Saleh, who was manning the ballot 
box.  Her tenacity also caught the eye of PM Abdul Kader 
Ba-jammal who called her "the Fighter" after she was the only 
woman to observe every second of the voting and counting of 
ballots, which lasted until the next morning.  (Note: 
Ba-jammal became the new GPC Secretary General during the 
conference by presidential fiat, thus sparing him the trouble 
of campaigning like the Khatari sisters). 
 
¶8.  In the end, the Fighter's strategy paid off and Fatima 
won a seat on the General Committee.  "Thank you for the 
workshops," Fatima said to the NDI coordinators present, 
"we really achieved something." 
 
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Comment 
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¶9.  Although Yemen is the poorest and least developed country 
in the region, women's political participation is 
significantly higher than neighboring oil-rich states.  Yemen 
was the first country on the Arabian Peninsula to enfranchise 
women and allow them to run for all national and local 
offices.  Women have been elected in every election since 
unification in 1990, albeit in very small numbers.  The ROYG 
has also showed a stronger commitment to integrating women 
into the political system, including supporting the 15 
percent quota for female representation in the 2006 local 
elections and creating a special women's representative on 
the national election commission. 
 
¶10.  Despite being a regional leader on women's rights, the 
Yemeni political system remains dominated by a handful of 
male government officials and tribal leaders. Even most 
men, especially those lacking familial connections to 
powerful politicians, find it difficult to break into the 
closed system.  While the rank-and-file GPC members hold 
little sway in overall party policy and government 
administration, the Khatari sisters' easy grasp of the basics 
of democratic campaigning bodes well for the future of women 
in Yemen.  With the help of MEPI funding, women are steadily 
gaining the skills necessary to begin slowly chipping away at 
the male-dominated political structure. 
Krajeski