Underage brides on the Arabian peninsula are in the news.
On April 29, an 8-year-old Saudi Arabian girl in the city of Onaiza finally won a divorce from her 47-year-old husband, after months of legal battles.
The girl’s father had married her to a friend to settle a debt. In Islam, he is permitted to do this. The girl’s mother, divorced from the father, went to court to annul the union. The judge, Sheikh Habib al-Habib, unsuccessfully tried to convince the husband, who already has two other wives, to divorce the girl. The judge then ruled that the mother was not the child’s legal guardian and therefore couldn’t represent her. Al-Habib suggested that the girl could file for divorce herself—when she reaches puberty. The judge ordered the husband not to have sexual relations with his child-bride until then.
The case was appealed. The higher court sent the case back, ordering al-Habib to reconsider his decision. Appeals courts do not generally demand reconsideration when they think the lower court has done excellent work. Nevertheless, al-Habib did not take the hint. On April 11, he reaffirmed his initial decision.
Reviews were mostly negative. UNICEF Executive Director Anne Veneman said: “Irrespective of circumstances or the legal framework, the marriage of a child is a violation of that child’s rights. Consent cannot be free and full when either party to a marriage is too young to make an informed decision.”
A representative of the government Human Rights Commission (yes, there really is one) noted that child marriages “violate international agreements the kingdom has signed,” referring to the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Saudi Justice Minister Muhammad al-Issa announced that the government would “regulate” marriages to child brides, to end the “arbitrariness by parents and guardians in marrying off minor girls.”
On the other hand, the Saudi grand mufti, Sheikh Abdul Aziz al-Sheikh, didn't understand what the problem was. He said in January that “if a girl exceeds 10 or 12 then she is eligible for marriage, and whoever thinks she is too young, then he or she is wrong and has done her an injustice. . . . Our mothers and before them our grandmothers married when they were barely 12. . . . Good upbringing makes a girl ready to perform all marital duties at that age.” (Some note that the prophet Mohammed himself set the Muslim standard by marrying Aisha when she was nine.)
The girl and her mother appealed again. While the second appeal was pending, another judge in Onaiza took over the case from al-Habib and finally got the husband to agree to a divorce.
Meanwhile, in nearby Yemen, in February the legislature passed a law enacting a minimum marriage age of 17. This followed last year’s worldwide spotlight on 9-year-old Yemeni girl Nujood, who courageously went to court by herself to free herself from her marriage to a man in his thirties.
She is not alone. Yemen’s Social Affairs Ministry says that more than 25% of girls marry before the age of 15. These marriages can be terribly brutal. The Associated Press recently reported on one case:
She was 2 years old when her father promised her in marriage to a man in his 30s. It was a swap, so the father could marry the man's sister without paying the obligatory bride-price. At age 9, the girl was put on a sack of rice to appear taller next to the bridegroom in the wedding picture. At 11, she was taken to her husband's house to live. Despite promising not to consummate the marriage before she reached puberty, he tied her to a bed, stuffed a rag in her mouth and raped her, she says. "One day he tied me up and attacked me," the girl, who is now 13 and has fled her husband. . . .
The new law is intended to end such abuses, but it has its detractors, who call it “un-Islamic.” Yemeni legislator Sheikh Mohammed al-Hazmi asserts that nothing in the Koran prohibits the practice of marrying prepubescent girls, and “everything that is not forbidden is permitted.”
Even if the law withstands these challenges, there is a question whether it will be, or can be, enforced in the face of prevailing attitudes. Still, having such laws to appeal to, and educating the population about those laws, can contribute to the process of changing attitudes. Cultures can be stubborn, but they aren’t immobile.
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