Daily Star - Remedy Women's Legal Status

EditorialWe are ashamed that it often requires Monday’s International Women’s Day to direct our attention to the abysmal condition of women’s rights in Lebanon, but we would be even more remiss if we did not on this occasion robustly call for the immediate adoption of legislation improving women’s rights.In a case waiting in the appellate courts, judges should rule as soon as possible that Samira Soueidan, a Lebanese woman whose Egyptian husband died, can pass on her Lebanese citizenship to their four children. To make the court’s job easier, Parliament should without delay rewrite the discriminatory 1925 laws which allow only Lebanese males to pass on their nationality to their progeny.It feels patently absurd to argue in the 21st century that each gender possessing the nationality of any country should be able to pass on their citizenship to their children, but that embodies the wretched status under which the women of Lebanon – and most Arab countries – live. Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria and Egypt have to their credit approved varying laws which give women this patently obvious right. We do not wish to pick on Lebanon’s mostly Christian opponents of such legislation, but a politically inconvenient demographic reality must not be allowed to prevent women from gaining one of the most basic human rights.The Cabinet recently approved a basket of electoral reforms including a 20-percent quota for women to represent each of the country’s major confessional groups. Many wise women and wise activists oppose quotas, offering evidence that such requirements can become counterproductive to the goal of promoting women’s rights without the necessary legal framework enshrining women’s rights, as well as a broad social acceptance of an active role for women in the public sphere. While we applaud the quota measure, we recommend that the government use it as only one small step in an array of initiatives designed to support a marked increase in women’s activity in public life. The government and Parliament should also without reservation give their full backing to the proposed family violence law. The superb KAFA, an NGO focusing primarily on women’s issues, has shepherded a draft law which would criminalize domestic violence, and require any man who assaults his female partner to pay all expenses for her medical treatment. Should it appear obvious that beating another human being is a crime, we must acknowledge that far too frequently the police consider domestic disturbances a private matter and ignore the criminal nature of domestic abuse.Lebanon has traditionally ranked among the top Arab nations regarding women’s rights, which sounds like the epitome of damning with faint praise. This country – and all those in the region – needs to set as a goal the immediate remedy of women’s legal status to match the most progressive nations anywhere in the world.