| Massouma al-Mubarak | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1947 Kuwait |
| Occupation | professor of political science |
| Website | |
| http://www.masouma-almubarak.com/ | |
Massouma al-Mubarak is Kuwait's first female government minister, sworn in on June 20, 2005.[1] She was Minister of Planning and Minister of State for Administrative Development. Massouma al-Mubarak was educated in the United States and is a professor of political science.[2]
Massouma went to the US for higher education in 1971. She has two master's degrees and a doctorate from the University of Denver.[3] Since 1982 she has been teaching political science at the Kuwait University.
She has been active in the field of equal rights for women and also writes a daily column for Al-Anba newspaper.[4] In 2002 she collected signatures on a petition opposing segregation by gender or abolishing coeducation in Kuwait.[5]
On 25 August 2007, Massouma resigned as Minister of Health following after a fire in a hospital in Jahra. The fire killed two patients.[6]
In the 2009 Kuwaiti parliamentary elections, she and three other women won seats to become the first women to enter the Kuwaiti parliament.[7]