Farida Ahmed

Almost 20 years ago, the Code of Procedure on Personal Status Matters was promulgated and was a paradigm shift for Egyptian women. For the first time, they had the right to file a "khula" lawsuit against her husband and divorce him within a few months instead of divorce cases that could take years. .

The law was passed in 2000 amid the welcome of women's and women's associations in general, and a large section of conservative men and groups was reserved.

However, nearly 20 years after its promulgation, MP Atef Makhlif, a member of the Human Rights Committee of the Egyptian House of Representatives, introduced the draft law he had prepared to amend the Personal Status Law, which, in its fourth axis, stipulates the abolition of all cases accepted by law for deposition and confining them to one case. It is only sexual dysfunction, claiming that the aim of his project is to repair the situation of a society that is suffering because of the current law and is experiencing a state of increasing divorce rates.

Why the law of "dislocation"?
Islamic law granted the spouses the right to terminate their incompatible marital life in accordance with specific procedures and conditions.As stated in the paper "Khula 'in Islam" prepared by the National Council for Women, God Almighty for women to take off her husband if the ten impossible.

Before the law appeared, there was no refuge for women who wanted to divorce from their husbands except to seek a divorce. The husband could accept, refuse or procrastinate, and the woman filed a divorce suit to roam the corridors of the courts for years after which she could get a divorce or the case could be dismissed.

After long jurisprudence, Law No. 1 of 2000 came out, and article 20 of the article stipulates that "the spouses may agree with each other on khul ', if they do not agree with it and the wife filed her lawsuit and redeemed herself and divorced her husband by relinquishing all her legal financial rights and replied to the dowry he gave her." The court divorced her. "

The court does not rule on divorce by khul 'except after attempting reconciliation between the spouses and reassigning two judgments to seek reconciliation between them within a period not exceeding three months after the wife decides that there is no way to settle in the marital life, and after explicitly deciding that she hates life with her husband and that there is no way to continue marital life between them She fears that the limits of God will not be established because of this hatred.

Prefer khula
The annual bulletin of marriage and divorce statistics for 2018 issued by the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics revealed the arrival of divorces 211,554, the proportion of cases of khula of this figure 83.5%, according to Al-Ahram electronic portal.

The ratio seems shocking to many, and may make some believe that women need guardianship because they do not use their right, which did the MP confine dislocation in sexual dysfunction only, but from the point of view of the woman who waives all her material rights for separation is proof of the intransigence of Egyptian men In the management of married life.

Domestic violence and harassment are the most important causes
According to the Egyptian Center for Women's Rights, women resort to abolishing all their rights rather than divorce, retaining their rights and seeking compensation in order to escape violence.The divorce case lasts for years while the khul 'takes months.

The Center's statement pointed to a study by the National Council for Women, which confirmed that 1.5 million Egyptian women are subjected to domestic violence annually, and that 70% of cases of abuse of wives are caused by their husbands.

Egyptian newspapers monitored most of the causes of khul 'cases filed by wives against their husbands from the corridors of the family court, the most important of which were violence against the wife, neglect, addiction, stinginess and harassment of women.

Angry responses
Since the announcement of the amendments of the member of the Human Rights Committee in the parliament, a state of controversy has been raised among the pioneers of social networking sites, and most of the comments on those amendments were cynical, while others put them to objectively discuss the other three axes of the law relating to the age of child custody, and the replacement of the vision system Hosting, nursery arrangement.

The fourth aspect of dislocation was that most of the views were regarded as a reversal of women's rights, especially since sexual dysfunction does not require the removal of women's financial assets.

Some comments pointed out that there were more important issues in which women needed to be removed rather than waiting for divorce for years, such as violence and non-expenditure, which were fundamental rights of women that would have been violated by the amendment if passed.