[Debate] Egypt: Islamists threaten to roll back legal gains for women

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

<http://www.almasryalyoum.com/en/node/487345>
Islamists threaten to roll back legal gains for women

Author: Ahmed Zaki Osman
Ahmed Abubaker, a 35-year-old teacher has little interest in politics
and barely followed the developments of the Egyptian revolution. But
this recent divorcee has now taken up protesting.

Al-Masry Al-Youm found him just recently at a demonstration in front
of the Ministry of Justice. Abubaker is joining likeminded divorced
fathers who are calling for a change to laws regulating custody over
their children. They believe that the current custody system, along
with other provisions in the personal status law, is against Islamic
Sharia law.

“Two months ago I couldn’t see [his six-year-old daughter] Maram for a
whole month. My ex-wife’s father told me that the security situation
was deteriorating and [the family] couldn't risk letting the girl go
far from home,” said Abubaker at the protest.

The problem he raised is not only due to the absence of police from
the streets of the working-class area in Omraniya where he and
ex-wife’s family live, but also the result of the law regulating the
divorced father’s right to see his children.

The debate over custody laws, which is usually accompanied by
arguments that Sharia supports the claims of divorced fathers, comes
within a context in which Islamist groups wants to curtail women’s
rights. Islamists argue that women’s legal gains in recent years are a
product of Hosni Mubarak’s pro-Western regime. Women’s rights
advocates, however, believe that the improved status of women is an
outcome of social activism, which managed to push women’s issues to
the fore.

Women’s gains under threat

In 2005, Egypt’s parliament, then dominated by the former ruling
National Democratic Party, passed legal amendments by which children
should remain in their mother's custody until age 15, up from 10 for
boys and 12 for girls.

The law states that fathers have the right to see their children only
three hours a week. Other members of the father’s family, such as
grandparents, don’t have the right to see the children unless
accompanied by the father in the three-hour visitation. Fathers also
don’t have the right to house their children without the mother’s
agreement.

Abubaker joined a Facebook page calling for changes to the custody
laws. Other fathers who stage regular protests in front of the
Ministry of Justice have joined newly established groups, such as the
“The Front for Saving the Family” and “The Coalition for Saving the
Egyptian Family”.

They staged small marches in front of the cabinet building, the
Ministry of Justice and the state radio and television building.
Fathers in governorates around Egypt formed local branches for the
group.

Salafi and Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated websites have been active in
covering these developments, which they describe as being “calls for
the application of Sharia.”

Family court judge Abdullah Albaga said in a TV interview in April
that the new age rules for custody contravene Sharia, and called for
the cancellation of the amendments, along with others, such as an
amendment from 2000 giving woman easy access to divorce though the
courts.

In the last decade, Egyptian women managed to erase some of the
egregious gender inequities enshrined in the laws regulating personal
status issues, such as reforming child custody laws, ensuring that
women have the right to add conditions to marriage contracts, and
providing women with the right to get a divorce through courts, known
as khola, which are based on Islamic law.

Before 2000, when new legal provisions for divorce were introduced, it
was nearly impossible for women to get divorced without the consent of
their husbands. Divorce cases could linger in the courts for up to a
decade, and even then, women would often not be granted the divorces
they requested.

Karim Younis, another father who is calling for the change, tells
Al-Masry Al-Youm that the divorced fathers have met with Ministry of
Justice officials, who said their demands are legitimate.

For feminists and secular political activists, these movements are
dangerous, since they’re based on specific and rigid interpretations
of Sharia.

“What you surveyed from groups and marches against the custody law are
indicators that there has been a major setback in the position of
women since the revolution,” says Karima Kemal, a journalist and
commentator.

“Conservative thinking is on the rise along with the rise of the
Islamic groups. They see all the developments that took place
concerning the status of women as Western and aimed at destroying the
family.”

Feminist activist Lamiyaa Lotfy agrees.

“We know that the custody law is unfair. Having only three hours a
week to see your child is unfair. That members of the father’s family
don’t have the right to see the child is also unfair. But the problem
is people don’t want [just] amendments; they want to take away all the
rights we fought for, alleging that they are anti-Sharia,” she says.

A Western import?

Perhaps the biggest impediment to improving the legal status of women
is the argument that such changes are being forced on Egypt by the
West and were pushed by former First Lady Suzanne Mubarak, who is
widely hated.

Elham Eidarous, a political activist, says this argument is used “to
distract people from seeing the efforts exerted by women’s NGOs in
order to push for the changes. Suzanne Mubarak wasn’t a feminist
actually," says Eidarous. "If the state pushed for positive
legislation to improve the status of women, this happened because of
local as well as international pressure.”

Women’s rights advocates may face crucial challenges with the election
of the next parliament, which many expect will be dominated by
Islamists. Some women’s activists fear that an Islamist-dominated
parliament would strip women of the rights they have gained.

“Women’s activists should build strategic relationships with civil
political parties that support women’s rights, " said Eidarous.
"Women’s NGOs shouldn’t be the only force defending women’s rights.
Organizing women from grassroots and forming coalitions are the
strategy. Women’s issues after the revolution should get rid of any
remains of elitism.”

One example of how to defend women’s rights by gathering women from
the grassroots is the Coalition of Custodian Women group, which has
staged various protests in recent months, mainly in Cairo.

“What we are seeing now is that ordinary women are speaking about
their rights," says Lotfy. "If you have a march that alleges that the
custody law is anti-Sharia and Western-based, you have on the opposite
side the Custodian Women, who staged similar marches in the street,
saying that they won't give up their rights over their children. In
this case, you can’t describe those women as being Western.”

Another new development is the degree to which Coptic women are making
their voices heard.

“That’s the radical change," says Kemal. "Coptic women are also
speaking out, either pressing the Church to change its position to
give them licenses for divorce or by pressing the state to push for a
new legislation that allows civil marriage.”

The silencing of women

Women’s rights advocates say that regression on personal status issues
is part of a larger problem of marginalizing women. After an
unprecedented showing during protests over the last six months, Egypt
women are now being told that they cannot take high political and
executive posts.

“The rise of the Islamist movement after the revolution poses
significant threats to gains made by Egypt’s women in many aspects
related to political representation, as well as, and especially in the
legal context, regulating the personal status law,” says Kemal.

The committee that drafted the constitutional amendments in March
didn’t include any women, and Prime Minister Essam Sharaf’s cabinet
has only one female minister. During the last governors reshuffle, no
female governors were appointed.

Minister of Local Development Mohsen al-Nomany said last month that
women are currently incapable of filling governorships due to the
deteriorating security situation.

On Wednesday, a coalition of feminist organizations sent a letter to
Deputy Prime Minister Ali al-Selmy calling on the government to ensure
that women will be represented in the committee that drafts the new
constitution. The letter indicates that any future constitution must
have anti-discrimination provisions.

However, Lotfy argues that at this very moment, Egyptians must not
evaluate the situation of women in isolation.

“Women aren’t represented in a fair way in the political scene. That’s
true, but who from the marginalized people is Egypt are being fairly
represented? Youth are still marginalized, disabled people are badly
discriminated against and people from Sinai can’t claim any
significant posts.

"It’s not only women who are unfairly represented. The old way of
thinking still dominates,” Lotfy says.

Publishing Date:  Wed, 17/08/2011 - 19:17

-- 
Yoshie Furuhashi
<http://mrzine.org/>