Riyadh: The women in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) will drive the train at the end of 2022, according to a Saudi rail official.
The Saudi women leaders are currently being trained and qualified to drive the train, in theory and in practice, under the direct supervision and follow-up of the Saudi Railway Technical Institute (Sirb).
According to Arabic daily Al Ekhbariya, Vice President of the Al-Haramain Express Train, Rayan Al-Harbi, stated that by the end of this year, Saudi women will be driving with high efficiency, the fastest train in the Middle East.
He noted that 32 flights are operated daily from the Sulaymaniyah station to Mecca and back again, noting that since the start of operation and so far, nearly 20,000 flights have been operated, and the accuracy of arrival on time has reached 95 per cent.
Al-Harbi added that there is a plan to localize and transfer management knowledge at a steady pace, as the percentage of Saudization of the Al-Haramain train jobs exceeded 94 per cent.
Until recently, job opportunities for Saudi women were limited to jobs such as teachers and medical workers, where they had to adhere to strict gender segregation rules.
Since Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman came to power in 2017, he has insisted on opening up the kingdom by diversifying the country’s economy and relaxing many gender-based rules.
Female participation in the labor market has doubled in the past five years to 33 percent, and women are now beginning to get jobs that were previously restricted to men and migrant workers.
After the transition to allow Saudi women to travel in the kingdom, from 2019 onwards Saudi Arabian women can also travel abroad without permission and may apply for their passports, ID documents and all official registrations directly without requiring a male guardian (mahram).
In February 2021, Saudi Arabia opened up military posts for women for the first time which allowed them to report through a unified portal.
In a first, Saudi female officers were allowed to guard Islam’s holiest site not just that the women were allowed driving license, and even elected to councils, and so on.