From the Guardaian
Unlimited (UK)
Dated Friday February 19
Why Iraqi women aren't complaining
Their secular family law is about to be overturned and placed under religious control. So where's the outcry?
By Haifa Zangana
Divorce cases are heard only in the civil courts (effectively outlawing the "repudiation" religious divorce); polygamy is outlawed unless the first wife welcomes it (and very few do); and women divorcees have an equal right to custody of their children.
The "liberators" of Iraq can take no credit for this. The secular family code was introduced in 1959. Saddam Hussein weakened its inheritance provisions but left it mostly unchanged. Now it is under threat from the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council. IGC resolution 137 will, if implemented, eliminate the idea of civil marriage and place several aspects of family law - including divorce and inheritance rights - directly under the control of religious authorities . . . .
Ten months after their "liberation", Iraqi women have only just started to leave their houses to carry out ordinary tasks such as taking their kids to school, shopping or visiting neighbours. They do so despite the risk of kidnapping or worse. It is women and children who bear the brunt of the absence of law and order, the lack of security and the availability of weapons.
Ten months on, most women graduates are still unemployed. Seventy-two per cent of working Iraqi women were public employees, and the public sector is in tatters. Other workers are suffering too. My niece, Luma, is a biologist. She was unemployed during Saddam's era because she wasn't a member of the Ba'ath party. She is unemployed now because she refused to get a tazkia (a recommendation form) from one of the main political parties represented in the IGC.
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