> ## Content Index
> Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.opendemocracy.net/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further.

# Religious candidates triumph in Saudi elections
- URL: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/19378/
- Published: 2005-05-03T19:05:00.000Z
- Updated: 2019-02-14T22:33:15.000Z
- Author: openDemocracy Supporters
- Tags: #en, #Migrated, #Import 2026-04-09 18:15

A young Saudi blogger, Ahmed, on his experience of the first (municipal) elections in Saudi Arabia in 30 years in[ Global Voices](http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/globalvoices/?p=147&ref=opendemocracy.net). He describes how campaign posters bore the only non-blurred pictures of human faces seen on Saudi streets (usually pictures of people are banned by religious decree). Only 7 could be elected from 646 candidates; women were not allowed to vote; and a group of hardline Islamic candidates (the ["Golden List"](http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-4959100,00.html?ref=opendemocracy.net)) dominated the results. Still Ahmed says: "I was proud to be a part of this historical event". Let's hope it marks the beginning of something better.

There seems to be a lot of [disappointment](http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A12398-2005Apr23?language=printer&ref=opendemocracy.net) going around about the Islamists winning so big, but what are you supposed to do when a democratic election elects non-democratic candidates? [Geoff Mulgan in the FT](http://news.ft.com/cms/s/7fce1008-b914-11d9-bfeb-00000e2511c8.html?ref=opendemocracy.net) this weekend reviews a few books that explore this question.