Support women’s sports clubs, say Saudi Shoura Council members

Saudi women have shown outstanding performances in all fields. (Social media)

• Women had shown outstanding performance in different fields such as education, leadership, and economics

MAKKAH: Members of the Shoura Council have called on the General Sports Authority to study the best way of setting up and supporting women’s sports clubs in the Kingdom.
Members said that sports clubs would help expedite development in Saudi Arabia and actively engage women in society.
Dr. Ahmed Al-Shuwaikhat, a member of the Social Affairs, Family and Youth Committee, said clubs would further empower women as well as increase competitiveness and participation.
Women had shown outstanding performance in different fields such as education, leadership, and economics, he added, noting that clubs would be founded in 13 administrative regions and provided with enough support to help women practice all sports anywhere and anytime.
“The calls for finding new mechanisms for establishing women’s clubs Kingdom-wide come simultaneously with the calls for supporting women to hold senior positions in the government. The Kingdom is a part of this world and the sports activities that take place in this world,” he told Arab News.
Setting up women’s sports clubs would help to restore “psychological and physical balance” in society, he added, and give women a chance to participate regionally and internationally.
Lina Almaeena, a member of the Shoura Council, said the Vision 2030 reform plan that was announced in 2016 enabled women and girls to exercise their rights and that it also aimed to increase the number of people playing sports from 13 percent to 40 percent.
“We are seeing a sustainable development of which sport is an integral part,” she told Arab News. “Sport is also part of our culture and will strike a balance between both sexes and empower women in the public sector. Women’s sports clubs will restructure themselves, especially in light of the fact that women have become members in 74 sports federations in the Kingdom. Saudi women play a pivotal role as members in these clubs,” she said.
She said the Shoura Council wanted women’s clubs to be set up in the same way as men’s clubs.
Hoda Al-Helaissi, a member of the Shoura Council, told Arab News that women’s sports clubs would complement the social development unfolding in the Kingdom. She stressed that such decisions empowered women and helped them to overcome obstacles in their lives.