13 July, 2017
Women in Saudi Arabia can't drive but at least now they can play sports.
"I don't think it's right for a young girl to take a sports class in school, she will grow harsh and rough, which goes against her delicate nature", banker Mohammed M.S was quoted as saying.
Opposition politicians have accused the government of suppressing the report amid speculation that it points to United Kingdom ally Saudi Arabia as a source of funds for Islamist extremists.
Schools in the kingdom are segregated along gender lines.
Dr Mashael Alshaikh, a Saudi citizen and the lead author of The Ticking Time Bomb in Lifestyle-related Diseases Among Women in the Gulf Cooperation Council Countries, said part of the problem stems from a lack of facilities and preventive health care for women.
Saudi public schools will begin offering physical education for girls in the coming academic year, the kingdom's education ministry announced on Tuesday, a long-awaited step toward social reform in the Islamic kingdom.
However, some restrictions have been loosened in recent years - women were allowed to vote for the first time in 2015, and further reforms have been promised under the rule of King Salman, who acceded to the throne two years ago.
Outside of a few upscale gated compounds where foreigners live and select neighborhoods, women do not jog or exercise in public spaces, and they are banned from attending sporting matches in the country's male-only stadiums. In its 2016 research, Human Rights Watch found that women were increasingly claiming their right to play sports, but that the country's national policies and male guardianship system created sometimes insurmountable hurdles to meaningful participation in exercise. A handful of private sports clubs have emerged over the years, allowing some women to join in female basketball leagues.
The kingdom has recently introduced several measures to improve women's health including licences for female gyms.
The female-only University in the capital, Riyadh has a large gym along with outdoor soccer pitches, running tracks and indoor swimming pools. When in public, women in Saudi Arabia are expected to cover from head to toe.
The move to provide physical education for girls is part of Saudi Arabia's ambitious 'Vision 2030', a raft of far-reaching reforms created to modernise the Kingdom's economy and wean it off its dependence on oil revenue. It says 13 percent of the Saudi population exercises once a week. The plan aims to increase that number to 40 per cent.
