What’s holding back women of the Middle East and North Africa region to step into the office?
Despite the number of women graduates in the MENA region, the labour force only has 26% women — a number that’s less than half the global average.
In order to find a solution to the problem, you must find the reason why it happened first. “Islamic laws prohibit women from working, going out alone and even worse, talking to men.” And since the main religion of the MENA countries is Islam, the women living there face unequal pay, death threats, or even worse, the violations of human rights including No torture and inhuman treatment, Right to privacy, Rights to marry and have family, Freedom of thought and religion, Freedom of opinion and expression, Right to work and a couple others too. The people (not all, but most) bring the name of Islam and Allah to shut them up. It was never stated in Quran that women shouldn’t work. And in fact, the Prophet’s wife Khadija is one of the most successful merchants at that time. It was neither stated that women shouldn’t talk to a guy, or shouldn’t drive. This clearly means that the Islamic laws or the religion has NOTHING to do with the women’s rights, but it’s the people who have been opposing them and are being misogynists.
UAE criminalized honor killings and the women from the KSA started to get their driving licenses, but just UAE and KSA are not the case in the MENA countries. Many other countries have not been taking much action in ages against the honor killings. UAE is one of the most famous and developed countries that attract tourists from all over the world. It needed to change its laws, so it just did. However, the KSA is slightly different, women there still suffer from the fact that they’re still under the guardianship of men. The legislation ruled that a woman could not handle her own affairs and she needed a man to decide on her. On the other hand, no legal age has been set for a man who can handle women’s affairs, and any male in the family of an adult woman is considered eligible to become her guardian, even if he has NOT reached the legal age of majority.
They think that women cannot decide for themselves, nor control their emotions. Though women in KSA can drive now, they still can’t open a bank account or have a medical procedure without permission from their male guardians. They even cannot receive an equal inheritance, and can’t marry or divorce, without permission from their male guardians. Their parents oppose them to work before they get married and after their marriage, their husbands do. They are left to choose one between a married life where their parents pick the groom and a job that doesn’t pay nearly as much as men (with which you can’t even afford an apartment to live in). I admit that there are women who resign willingly after marriage, but what about others who could not live up to their dream? Who are being opposed, facing death threats, and being killed? People think women would bring dishonor to the family if they’re let to live free. So they impose harsh restrictions and oppose them from pursuing their interests.
The citizens have been brainwashed for ages now. There are few countries where there’s a minimum legal age for marriage, but mostly no one respects it. So, there are governments from Lebanon, Morocco, KSD, UAE that take action for the equality of women (not much, but at least they do); but what about others like Yemen where there’s no even a legal age of consent.
In other cases, women empowerment plays a key role but here, it’s not the women that chose not to get out and work; it’s the family and society that has opposed her. So my stance on the solution would be teaching people that the religion never stated that a woman can’t live according to her wish and creating a change. The result might be small, but it sure makes some rippling effect within the country and it definitely inspires other women too. Also, the governments need to take action and criminalize honor killings as it is a massive threat to women (both adults and children). The women should be given back their right of living free; furthermore, they should be given the freedom for being legally responsible for themselves and their children once they’re above 18, because a male who is under 18 restricting (guarding, according to the countries) adult women sounds truly insane. We can’t change the customs of a religion that people have been following for over 1400 years, but we surely can change the cultures and the lifestyles. It all doesn’t happen over a night; it takes time and it needs time. But it is worth it. Teaching the students about diversity is an important thing because classrooms are only the place where they get to learn that people have their differences and we need to respect them. It should not just be taught, but also made to put in practice to respect EVERYONE, despite their age, race, religion, physical abnormalities, mental disorders, gender orientation, or sexual preference. Many things influence people inside the country, like the government, laws, adults, society, movies, music, bigwigs, and whatnot. Just as importantly, the law should take severe action against the honor killings and other complaints about women’s harassment and abuse. They must make sure that no one misuses their rights, and follows the law. The FGM’s should stop as soon as possible as they’re violating both girls’ and women’s fundamental rights. Finally, Exclusion of women from politics, freedom of movement, gender equality and pay-equality, child marriages, marital rapes, health discrimination, inequality in divorce and inheritance, access to justice, and the freedom to move out of the country individually without a guardian’s consent to get employed or educated or any other reason are the other things that need to be taken care of.
Now, let’s talk about the time when a teen girl was killed and buried by her father and brother for talking to a guy (no one was arrested and she was buried without examination), and a woman was raped by a worker in order to prove to the court that she was cheating on the husband and that the husband had to kill her. It’s not just these two, but many stories from the different corners of the world rise about honor killings and eventually disappear into thin air. They’re not to be disappeared, but to be addressed. It’s time for the change we’ve been dreaming of. Not even a single girl is destined to be under men’s restrictions, but there’s a whole country and even worse, a couple countries like that. Changes from within the country should start eventually, and so do them from outside the country as well. As mentioned earlier, it all needs time and I think that gender equality would be the right thing to start on, and moved on later to the other issues.
Acronyms used:
MENA-Middle East and North Africa
UAE-United Arab Emirates
KSA-Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
FGM-Female Gender Mutilation.
References to confirm my recent claim:
https://amp.theguardian.com/.../ugliest-outcry-in-sudan...
https://www.youm7.com/.../%D8%AC%D8%B1%D9%8A%D9.../4842935
Other References: Women from the MENA region, whose identities are kept anonymous.
