“How do you expect us to report on the credibility of elections when civil groups are not permitted to observe vote casting and ballot counting?” - Samih Sunukrut, secretary general of the Arab Organisation for Human Rights. The Jordanian Coalition for Civil Society Organisations announced on Tuesday it would drop a plan to monitor parliamentary […]

The topic this week was surprisingly about prices and energy. I say surprisingly because the Jordan Business team has just finished a major cover story on inflation in the country, which essentially questions the government’s statements on the topic, and the measures they’ve taken (or lack thereof) to curb it. I have to admit that […]

Knowing my love for political discussions and political sittings, my boss let me tag along to a “salon seyasi” at the World Affairs Council. I don’t believe “salon seyasi” has an actual English translation but it is basically an informal get together, meet-up, or forum, where people sit around the perimeter of an open room […]

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water, there are more food poisoning cases. After fish, water and shawarmah (several times), humus is suspected by officials, to be the latest culprit.

Health Minister Salah Mawajdeh told The Jordan News Agency, Petra, that final results are expected to be out in […]

The Jordan Center for Social Research has conducted another poll, about 6 months after its first horrifying one. As before, I’ll run down the results as mentioned in a Jordan Times article, to spare you the excessive reading.
According to the poll:
- 64.8% of Jordanians see the Kingdom as generally being on the right […]

Yesterday, on my way to work, the middle-aged taxi driver initiated an explicit elections conversation with me. Making a passing comment about the suddenly increasing “vote for me” banners around town I was prompted to ask him whether he’d be voting for anyone:
“a3othoo billah!”
“leish?” (why?)
“Because all these guys are sons-of-a-bitches! They take our votes […]

Parliamentary elections are officially up and running now. The first two days of candidate registration saw 916 names and as Lina points out, 15.8% of which are women. That’s a pretty decent percentage in my case, considering that the majority of that number are from fairly conservative cities like Irbid and Kerak. Although it’s yet […]

The Jordan Times today has an interesting article on former MP Nariman Roussan who won her seat in the 14th parliament through the women’s quota. Apparently (and allegedly) Roussan, who was president of “Al-Awn Society for Helping Widows”, used the charity’s funds for “campaigning purposes”, or in layman’s terms: bribes. The Society’s building was also […]