On the other hand Jordanian women do have a strong lobby in prominent women as HRH Princess Basma and HRH Queen Nur as well as a small group of intellectual and highly politicized women in the NGO-landscape. Where women's concerns are represented the priorities are set by this small elite. Not distinguishing between charity and development, the law clearly excludes political goals of NGOs. A narrow concept of politics is applied. Not only the foundation of a new organisation is due to permission by the Ministry.
Every single activity has to be approved.
The NGOs registered with the MSD automatically become members of the General Union of Voluntary Societies, an umbrella organisation which is supposed to give training and support to the NGOs and to coordinate their activities. They are not restricted by the law for NGOs. Being founded by royal decree and with Princess Basma being president of the Queen Alia Fund and Queen Nur being president of the Nur al-Hussain Foundation they have a special relationship to the authorities and don't report to the Ministry. This gives them much more freedom not only in their decisions over their activities, but also in direct access to foreign donors, which the other NGOs officially are not allowed to establish. Therefore they are more flexible and can accumulate funds, very much to the disadvantage of smaller NGOs.