Women Rights in Libya and Morocco - Research Paper Example

Women Rights in Libya and Morocco: A Comparison In 2007, even though 70% of graduates in the Arab world were women, however, they only represent, roughly, 25 to 30 percent of the actual work force (Knidiri). What exactly amounts to this disparity in numbers is a mixture of culture, tradition and, mainly, a lack of education. We need not concern ourselves with the whole of Arab world, as this paper seeks to study the state of women and their rights in two Arab countries: Libya and Morocco. An attempt shall be made to compare and contrast the state of women in these countries and how the respective governments (in case of Libya both the Gaddafi regime and the present National Transition Council) of these countries deal with issues pertaining to women. To be fair, both countries have many similarities when it comes to their social and cultural spheres, however, they are quite dissimilar when it comes to politics. The countries have strong similarities when it comes to languages, as well as their religion, with most of the population following the Maliki school of thought of Islam. Moreover, both countries have a patriarchal system, with need for more steps to be taken for the emancipation of women. Coming to their differences: from 1969 till 2011, Muammar Gaddafi presided in Libya after a successful coup. His regime sought to bring changes in the country at its onset; however, soon it was clear that Gaddafi sought to have complete hegemony, with little to no patience for dissent. His policies caused a lot of hardship to the common people, both directly and indirectly – as in the case of the sanctions placed by UN. Morocco, on the other hand, is a parliamentary constitutional Kingdom that gained independence in 1956. Moroccans are allowed free speech, and the freedom to form associations and gather for discussions freely, albeit a few impediments are placed when it comes to Islam and the monarchy (Sadiqi). Libya has been quite progressive in certain respects as far as women are concerned: women were granted the right to vote in 1964 (Birke) and the country has been a signatory to CEDAW, albeit with certain reservations, being the first Arab country, in 2004, to adopt the optional protocol that allows women to petition a UN committee in case their rights have been violated (2004). Morocco, on a similar note, has had woman suffrage since its inception in 1956 (Sadiqi), and is a signatory to CEDAW. Both Libya and Morocco placed certain reservations when signing CEDAW when it came to certain clauses that dealt with personal laws, proclaiming that they went against the Shari’ah, or the rules of Islamic jurisprudence. Interestingly, Morocco has, as of 2008, decided to lift all its reservations on CEDAW (Sadiqi). When it comes to education, both countries have the same stance of allowing the same opportunities to the people irrespective of gender. Women education is not only sanctioned, but actually encouraged. On ground, however, the fact of the matter is that in both countries women lag behind their male counterparts in education. In 2005, 70.7% of the female population in Libya was literate, as opposed to 91.8% of men (Pargeter). In Morocco, as per World Bank figures, in 2007, about 43.2 percent of adult females were literate, whereas 69.7 percent of their male counterparts were considered literate (Sadiqi). In both countries, the statistics are even lower when it comes to rural women. In Morocco, this disparity does not have more to do with sexual discrimination, rather it is the rural women who do not end up getting an education, so it is more a matter of situational discrimination. Despite that, there have been many women who have achieved university degrees and are contributing successfully within their fields. Though, in both countries, due to societal and cultural pressures, women tend to restrain themselves to work within a few “honored” fields, like education and medicine, with certain fields, like engineering for example, considered to be the domain of men. Though both Libya and Morocco allow women, professionally, to attain all they want, however, both countries have placed certain limitations on women when it comes to work. In Libya, for example, it is unlawful for women to seek or undertake heavy labor or dangerous work (Pargeter). What is more, women cannot be made to work more than 48 hours in a week (Pargeter). In Morocco as well, as per Decree No. 2-56-1019 of 1957, women are prohibited from performing dangerous work (Tahri). This clearly demonstrates a certain bias. Interestingly, however, Gaddafi was known to espouse what was called State Feminism, calling for military training for women, encouraging them to join special police forces and military academies as well as become body guards, albeit the society did not look favorable upon these initiatives (Pargeter). In just such a bid, in 1979, women could not get married without getting a military certificate after taking military training (Spellman-Poots). However, in both countries, the encouragement of the governments for women participation has not really helped alleviate the status of women in rural areas due to, among other reasons like lack of education, sociocultural pressures from the males in the family. In Morocco, recently, certain fields, like law enforcement, have started opening up for females, and women are encouraged to enlist. That is true of the judicial sector too, where women are encouraged to become judges, especially in the family courts, making it easier for women who seek redress in such courts to find sympathetic judges, instead of the wary patriarchal inclined judges. Moroccan women have also been given training to help them become religious leaders in their society, thus empowering women further by giving them female leaders from within themselves. There are certain safeguards that are given to women at their workplace. Both Libyan and Moroccan women are given fully paid maternity leaves, with breaks given for breast feeding for a period after the woman rejoins the workplace. Libyan women are given a bit more in the form of mandatory day care centers for their children to be provided by the employer in certain cases. In Libya, women have the right to seek legal redress in cases of sexual discrimination at employment, however, there is no data whether such cases, when brought to court, are successful or not. What is more, women are still expected to consult their male relatives before they institute such proceedings, although the law does not place any such limitation upon them. There is no legislation, however, to prevent sexual harassment at work, or to pursue such harassment in court (Pargeter). Moroccan women, on the other hand, do have the right to seek redress in cases of sexual harassment at work (Zirari). Women, both Libyans and Moroccan, are given the right to not only own property but to dispose it of however they may wish. In Libya, under Gaddafi’s regime, the private sector was really limited and not allowed to flourish, therefore, as it stands there is little to no private industry. Under Moroccan law, there is no need for the consent of a husband or a father when it comes to employment or business – in Morocco a woman is given the right to enter into any employment or start any business venture without asking for a husband’s authorization. Be that as it may, the reality of the matter is that high level contracts are handed over to men usually. Furthermore, the fact that Moroccan society is socially conservative and the intermingling of sexes is not looked favorably upon, or makes people uncomfortable, women usually do not get involved in business ventures. Be that as it may, the laws of inheritance in both countries lay down that the women are to inherit half of their male relatives when it comes to a family estate. Although they are free to do whatever they want with their share by law, however, most women actually end up ceding what little they might inherit in favor of their male relatives. This is actually a social custom whereby, perhaps, the women repudiate what little rights they have to their male relatives to show their fealty and loyalty to the family. Libya, as well as Morocco, has laid down the “equal work – equal pay” policy, entailing that women should not be paid less for the same amount of work. But the truth is that mostly women still receive less pay than their male counterparts. What is more, there are very few women to be found in the higher management of any work place in both Libya and Morocco. Libyan women, like their male counterparts, do not have the right to form unions at work place. In Morocco, unions are allowed, although the fact that such unions are not allowed for agricultural and domestic workers, both of which are predominantly female, does not help matters much. What is more, union activities in sectors where such unions are legalized, take place at night and, like Libya, the society in Morocco frowns upon women going out of their house after dusk. Though by law women are not only allowed but encouraged to participate in all professional activities the males are involved in, yet in reality the socio-cultural pressures make it next to impossible for most women to participate. When it comes to personal law, there are quite a few concessions made to women. Although completely sanctioned by Islam, both Gaddafi’s Libya and the government of Morocco (although it was much later for the latter) have placed quite a few restrictions on polygamy. According to Libyan law, at least before the revolution and consequent ouster of Gaddafi, men could not take a second wife unless they fulfilled certain conditions, including obtaining a certificate from a judge to be fit for second marriage, both physically and economically. However, the interim government has gone back on this, and amongst the first few steps that they took upon taking power was repeal the quasi-prohibition of polygamy on the basis that it went against the tenets of Islam (Santini). Morocco has had a completely opposite experience with polygamy. A bid to ban polygamy or put restrictions on it was unsuccessful in 1999, however, in January of 2004, restrictions were placed on polygamy (Sadiqi), including making it mandatory for men to seek permission from their first wives beforehand as well as seeking a judicial certificate that allowed them the second marriage. When it comes to marital abuse, even marital rape, the law is pretty much ambiguous in both countries. There are no separate laws that detail with these issues, though the penal codes of the respective country are to be applied in these cases. Marital rape, however, has no recognition in law of either country. Marital abuse is a contentious topic and Libya does not have any law to deal with it. Moroccan law does give women the right to bring their abuser to court, however, to prove such incidents they have to bring a witness, and if they fail to prove their case they are forced to return home with the alleged abuser, which actually makes their position precarious as they might end up getting beaten or abused all the worse for bringing the matter to the authorities (Tahri). Both Libya and Morocco do not allow men to repudiate their marriage on their own. They have to go to court to seek a divorce. The divorce proceedings can be started by the woman as well, with a judge presiding over the proceedings and deciding upon the merits of the case. Moreover, the children are supposed to be given in their mothers’ custody in such cases, with the onus on the men, i.e. the children’s fathers, to bear all costs and expenses of the children. In Morocco, judge trainings have been carried out to make judges more sensitive of the issues, as well as setting aside a fund that guarantees payment of alimony and child support pursuant to an enforceable judgment. However, as is the case in other matters, there are certain scions in society that look upon these rights unfavorably, citing them as against Islam as well as citing fear that the family unit will break down as a consequence, with men being scared to marry due to the laws being against them. Such laws have been enacted in Morocco recently (in 2004) and, rather than a decrease in marriage after these reforms, as asserted by the Islamists, statistics show that “the number of people filing for marriage registrations actually rose about 30 percent in the four years after the code was changed, to 307,000 from 236,000. The number of divorces, according to the ministry, has stayed relatively flat over the same period, rising to 27,900 from 26,900, or about 3 percent” (Huffington Post). No such data exists for Libya, however. Polygamy, repudiation, khula and unequal inheritance rules still exist, in Moroccan society mostly because they are considered to be allowed by Islam and even feminists are reluctant to push for these changes, especially as they do not want to jeopardize other work done in regards to women’s rights. Both Libyan and Moroccan women can, now, pass on their nationality to their children. As per the 2007 nationality code of Morocco, gender equality with respect to citizenship rights is being improved, though such laws, in Morocco, do not apply on those women who have married outside the country or, in case of Muslim women, outside their religion. It is interesting to note that no such restriction is placed upon Moroccan men. Although Libya does not have state of the art medical facilities, however, medical care guaranteed to all its citizens irrespective of gender. Morocco also guarantees this right to its female citizens. However, unlike Libya, contraceptive methods and contraception is not only covered within the medical care, but is also announced to be so, helping Moroccan women to have control over their reproductive lives, and not just be tools for reproduction, as they were deemed to be in the past. Abortion is illegal in both the countries, though Morocco does allow it in certain cases, for instance rape. However, because the government is pretty undecided about the issue and does not have a fixed policy, Moroccan women, like their Libyan counterparts, are forced to seek illegal abortions, especially in cases of unmarried pregnancies, causing many fatalities (Sadiqi). Again, this has a lot to do with the notion of acceptable female behavior vis-à-vis the family’s honor, than it actually has to do with the provision of health care to females. Single women with children, especially those born out of wedlock, are frowned upon and not considered socially acceptable in most spheres of society, and there are no laws to protect them or their rights, or the rights of the children. Interestingly enough, both countries have reduced sentences for men who commit crimes of “honor” (or at least what is deemed to be honor when it comes to the patriarchal family structure) whereby a woman is either beaten or killed due to her behavior being incompatible with the family honor – this mostly entails that the girl is sexually involved with someone. Though Morocco law has decreed the same reduction of sentence for women who commit a crime based on “honor” judges are reluctant to implement it (Sadiqi). Interestingly, though, only women are supposed to be punished for out of wedlock sexual activity with no punitive controls on the man she was sexually involved with (Sadiqi). It can be said that both countries still consider a woman’s sexuality to be under the family’s control and not her own. Although prostitution is not legalized in Morocco, yet it is practiced and the government neither condones it, nor are the authorities quick to apprehend prostitutes. However, this results in their not being ample laws to safeguard the rights of such women. It is, perhaps, due to the fact that such women are not considered to be “honorable” women and, thus, their rights are of little to no importance to the public in general. The testimony of a Libyan woman is considered to be half that of a Libyan man as per their laws, a predicament that Moroccan women face when it comes to family matters alone, in all other matters their testimony is considered to be equal to that of a man (Tahri). In the political arena, women in Gaddafi’s Libya were encouraged to participate, however, the truth of the matter is that only women from certain privileged families, linked to Gaddafi in one way or another, were allowed to rise in the echelons. The case of Morocco, until recently, was not different: although women were encouraged to participate in the political process not many were elected or came to hold office. The legislative elections of Morocco, from 8 female candidates in 1977, rose to 967 in 2002, with the number of elected officials rising from 0 to 35 (Tahri). Moreover, in the local elections of 2009, female candidates won 3,408 seats, a number almost 30 times more than the previous elections – 127 (Zirari). Also, a 2002 revision in the Organic Law on the Chamber of Representatives fixed a quota of 10% female representatives in the parliament, which does not seem much on paper, but compared with the facts that it is the highest representation of women in any Arab parliament and that the representation of women in the US is 14%, it seems like a remarkable feat. Comparing it to the present day Libya, where for the first time an international women’s rights conference took place in November 2011, it is hard not to miss the fact that the present Libya and its National Transition Council have largely excluded women from the highest level of decision making (Spellman-Poots). Interestingly, the transition government only has 2 women among its 24 ministers, and female representation in NTC is 1:40 (ICAN). The fact of the matter is that Morocco has seen more female participation and has had various Non-governmental organizations fighting for women’s rights since, almost, its independence. It was these women organizations that helped changed the Personal Status Code recently to incorporate amendments and revisions that favored females and helped gain equality for them. The Libyan women have, up until less than a year ago, never had this chance. It is only now that various women’s organizations or associations have started operating (Foundation for the Future), and that is why it will take them time to take root within the society. It is interesting to note, furthermore, that although Moroccan society is almost as conservative and as socio-culturally similar to Libya, however, the way matters are progressing, it seems that the Moroccans are on a path to further empowering their womenfolk. The Libyans, on the other hand, after the revolution, have seen rightists gain control, as per Santini, according to “[t]he short-lived Draft Constitutional Charter put forward by the National Transition Council (NTC), equal and civil rights were to be accorded irrespective of ‘religion, belief, race, language, wealth, kinship, political opinion or social status’. Notably, gender was not included in that list. However, a more socially conservative goal, the protection of family and marriage, ranked high in the core tasks of the future Libyan state.” Moreover, even though Hillary Clinton asked for inclusion of women in the TNC, her please was met with little to no success (Santini). This shows a future trend, perhaps, of thwarting women’s rights further and undoing what little Gaddafi had allowed the female Libyans in form of certain assurances and guarantees under the law. However, Santini is also quick to point out that perhaps it is too soon to talk about these signals, disturbing as they may be, that show that women’s rights will come under threat, because elections have not been held yet. Only when an elected government takes control will these matters be resolved. It is heartening to note that the Moroccan government is working side by side with the NGOs in a bid to improve the status of women within the society. What is more, the government, in collaboration with the United Nations Population Funds, has been carrying out seminars and conferences to educate people about issues like violence against women and how to deal with them. The law enforcement personnel as well as medical personnel are given training as to how to deal with such issues. Furthermore, many shelters and help lines have started operating that assist victims of violence. Statistics show that about 30 to 40 percent of women admitted to the ER every month admit to being victims of spousal abuse (UNFPA).What is more, the support being garnered for the revision of laws that gave women rights like divorce and custody of children was actually garnered with the help of the Qur’an and Islamic jurisprudence (UNFPA); the activists lobbying for these rights sought a reform in “the vocabulary of Islam, and not Western feminism” (Huffington Post). On the other hand, it seems as if the TNC in Libya is using the traditional and old interpretation of Islamic jurisprudence to thwart what little rights were afforded to the Libyan women. Although many commentators are quick to blame Islam and claim that it is Islam that holds the women of these societies to be inferior to men, hence, causing them to live like second class citizens, however, as seen in the case of Morocco, it is actually the interpretation of Islam, which so far has been left to the men in the society, that is much to blame. Also, there is a clash between the modern elements in the society, as well as the traditionalists who want to hold on to the ways of yore, which this paper is quick to point out are all based on a patriarchal system. There is, however, much more work that needs to be done in order for both Libyan and Moroccan women to be raised to the same status as men in their societies because, despite the law claiming them to be equal to men in the eyes of law, the reality of the matter is that the society does not see eye to eye with the law on this issue. The women of both countries have a long way to go before they achieve full autonomy. Both countries are conservative when it comes to family and women. The patriarchal mindset of most of the populace, especially those residing in the rural areas, is one of the biggest impediments to empowering women in both Libya and Morocco. There is a certain sense of outrage, though it might not be expressed, if the state is thought to be meddling in what was, until recently, a family affair. Having a female relative engage in activities that might be considered to bring dishonor upon the family are not only frowned upon, but are deemed to be matters for the family itself to deal with. That is one of the reasons why despite there being laws that allow women many freedoms, the women of both countries find themselves helpless when it comes to attaining those freedoms. It is, indeed, too soon to talk about Libya and how the government, whenever it is elected, will deal with women issues, though such issues might be put on the backburner. It might fall to the international community, however, to deal with the future government and urge them to take a strong stance in this regard to elevate the status of women. However, as far as Morocco is concerned, it is clear to see that the country is well on the path of socio-political empowerment of women in a bid to bring their status up and make them equals to the men in the society. Works Cited “Assessing Needs of Civil Society in Libya – An Analysis of the Current Needs and Challenges of the Civil Society in Libya.” Foundation for the Future. Foundation for the Future, Nov. 2011. Web. 14 Apr. 2012. Birke, Sarah. “At a Glance: Women’s Rights in Libya.” TheNational.ae. Abu Dhabi Media, 22 Mar. 2011. Web. 13 Apr. 2012. Di Giovanni, Janine. “Women at War: Marching to Freedom.” Vogue (Sep. 2011): 438,443,444,446 Web. 14 Apr. 2012. Knidiri, Mohamed. “Women in Arab Societies: The Case of Morocco.” Options Méditerranéennes A.87 (2009): 29-32. 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