The change is loath to come, and Saudi women are fleeing the kingdom
The Saudi Custodian Law, which deprives the women of the kingdom of their liberty and enslaves them to men, forces more and more women to flee the country. Experts warn that the phenomenon could harm Saudi Arabia's economic strength
20.03.2017
The Economist
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Can Saudi Arabia keep its women? In the past month, women have been appointed heads of two major banks in the country and the head of the kingdom's stock exchange, which on the face of it gives the women of the state a certain hope that the path to a satisfying career is not completely blocked. But the restrictions imposed on their lives are still so irritating and draconian that many women emerge quietly and secretly from outside the country.
Some leave when they travel with their families for a trip beyond Saudi Arabia. Others were sent to study at universities in the West at the expense of the state, and report their return indefinitely. There are those who exploit underground Internet services that offer them "worthwhile" marriages for men who will quickly transfer them to another country. Iman, a clerk at a private hospital in Riyadh, found a package deal: For $ 4,000, she will fly to Australia for a honeymoon during which she plans to escape.
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What drives them to escape is the "vilaya" - the law of guardianship. Although this law is less famous than the law prohibiting women from driving, it imposes more severe restrictions on their ability to move. To travel, to work or study outside Saudi Arabia, to receive medical treatment in a hospital or to issue an ID card, and even to leave prison after serving a sentence, the women need the consent of Wally, a guardian who is of course a man. From the day of their birth until the day of their death, they move from Wally to Lowley: from father to husband, and if these two die, to the nearest member of the family. Sometimes he or she may be an adolescent or a brother. In Saudi Arabia it is customary to treat boys as adults from adolescence, but women are treated as minors throughout their lives.
The guardian of Iman, the divorcee, is her 17-year-old brother, barely half her age. He allows her to work as a manager in the hospital, but he takes it for himself. She says he sees it as a mobile asset, and he spends her money on drugs and weekends at massage parlors in neighboring Bahrain. Her ex-husband refuses to let her meet their children. Her brother prevents her from completing her studies in Europe. If she complains, he threatens to hit her.
Guardianship Law - "Wallaya"
Every woman in Saudi Arabia is under the supervision of a male guardian
When there is no husband, father or brother in the vicinity, the guardian will be one of the children in the family
The women need the guardian's permission to travel outside Saudi Arabia, receive medical treatment, take out an identity card and even be released
She tried to go to court so her guardianship would be transferred to an older and more sympathetic brother, but the judge canceled the case while conducting a telephone conversation, she said. Although she dressed modestly and wore a niqab (which covers the entire face except the eyes), she thinks the judge was hostile to her because she represented herself. The help offered by the social services is poor, and shelters for battered women remind prisons of their barred windows and the ban on visitors.
When she hears other women say their brothers do not beat them, Iman assumes they are lying, "because they fear the shelters provided by the social service."
Bedouin tradition
It is estimated that the number of "escaping girls," according to Saudi terminology, is not accurate, but Mansur al-Askar, a sociologist at Iman Muhammad Ibn Saud University in Riyadh, claims that their rate is rising. He estimates that more than a thousand women escape each year from the kingdom, and many more run from Riyadh to Jeddah, the larger and more liberal coastal city.
Saudi academics who oppose the law argue that custodianship laws are not a requirement of Islam, but of Bedouin traditions still dominating Saudi Arabia. Khadijah, the first wife of the Prophet Muhammad, was a merchant who financially supported her husband. His other wives moved between Mecca and Medina without him. "Islam freed the women from the wilaya," says Hassan al-Maliki, a theologian from Riyadh who has been imprisoned several times for expressing mental independence. "A woman may choose who she will marry."
18% of women of working age are employed (compared to 65% of men)
1.9% of the lawyers are women
0.66% of the members of the local councils are women
It is estimated that over a thousand women are fleeing the country each year
* According to Economist figures, as of 2016
But the clerics who fill the judicial system see the guardians in a different way. In their view, they keep the vulnerable people in society and the integrity of the families, and as a result they maintain the integrity of society. Last December, the court sentenced one man to one year in jail for denouncing the Villaya on social networks. Another Saudi study at the University of Mecca acknowledged that some escapees may have been physically abused, but said most of them were affected by "inappropriate use of social networks, imitation of other cultures, and weak faith."
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Economists note that the system of guardianship reduces the wealth of Saudi Arabia. More than a quarter of the 150,000 students sent abroad by the kingdom each year are women, and since many of them are returning to their jobs or choosing to stay in more liberal places like Dubai, much of the $ 5 billion the government spends every year is lost. In a battle to preserve her talent, "says Naja al-Osaimi, a Saudi academic who has chosen to build her home in Britain.
The Hattings did not help
To the surprise of the liberals in Saudi Arabia, some of the most persistent defenders of the Villaya are women, especially in the southern provinces that reject progress, such as Asir. Although the network of fascinating enthusiasts such as StopEnslavingSaudiWomen # and IAmMyOwnGuardian #
Saudi women's cloth "and" I am my own guardian "), a social media campaign to stop the Villaya system has managed to collect only 14,000 signatures, and Saudi leaders are aware of the need to make the kingdom more friendly to women. Despite the fact that there are still men who send their photographs seeking work for their wives (and even participating in their work interviews), in 2012 the kingdom gave up on the need to obtain the guardian's approval for four types of work: selling in clothing stores, cooks and working in playgrounds. Rare to see a woman (Although they receive text message updates when they travel abroad), dress code is becoming a bit more relaxed throughout Saudi Arabia, and in the big cities women add Colors and ornaments for the traditional black dress that the state requires them to wear.In Bureida, the stronghold of Saudi puritanism, the veils that cover the women's faces have cracks in their eyes, and the headgear slide to their shoulders. Despite all this, the women are angry and frustrated. On social networks, videos showing women riding motorcycles became viral. So is a video with a silhouette of a woman holding a bottle of whiskey in her hand and dancing on the roof of her car. A black female band dressed in black sang protest songs on bumper cars, toy cars, skateboards, rollerblades, and other wheeled devices that they were permitted to obey by law. If the method does not adjust to changes, warns sociologist El Askar, it is feared that it will collapse. Judges and police must cooperate and prevent violent and depressing men from serving as guardians, he says. But to Iman, the hospital clerk, the reform can no longer wait. Her awaits a honeymoon in Australia.
http://www.haaretz.co.il/news/world/middle-east/.premium-1.3937691
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The Saudi Custodian Law, which deprives the women of the kingdom of their liberty and enslaves them to men, forces more and more women to flee the country. Experts warn that the phenomenon could harm Saudi Arabia's economic strength
20.03.2017
The Economist
Save 14 comments
Can Saudi Arabia keep its women? In the past month, women have been appointed heads of two major banks in the country and the head of the kingdom's stock exchange, which on the face of it gives the women of the state a certain hope that the path to a satisfying career is not completely blocked. But the restrictions imposed on their lives are still so irritating and draconian that many women emerge quietly and secretly from outside the country.
Some leave when they travel with their families for a trip beyond Saudi Arabia. Others were sent to study at universities in the West at the expense of the state, and report their return indefinitely. There are those who exploit underground Internet services that offer them "worthwhile" marriages for men who will quickly transfer them to another country. Iman, a clerk at a private hospital in Riyadh, found a package deal: For $ 4,000, she will fly to Australia for a honeymoon during which she plans to escape.
More articles on the subject
A Revolution in Baby Steps: The Young Generation Changes Saudi Arabia 10.03.2017 This article is available to subscribers only
Saudi police arrest woman who uploaded to Twitter a picture without a head scarf 13.12.2016 This article is available to subscribers only
Ruzi 07.08.2016 This article is available to subscribers only
What drives them to escape is the "vilaya" - the law of guardianship. Although this law is less famous than the law prohibiting women from driving, it imposes more severe restrictions on their ability to move. To travel, to work or study outside Saudi Arabia, to receive medical treatment in a hospital or to issue an ID card, and even to leave prison after serving a sentence, the women need the consent of Wally, a guardian who is of course a man. From the day of their birth until the day of their death, they move from Wally to Lowley: from father to husband, and if these two die, to the nearest member of the family. Sometimes he or she may be an adolescent or a brother. In Saudi Arabia it is customary to treat boys as adults from adolescence, but women are treated as minors throughout their lives.
The guardian of Iman, the divorcee, is her 17-year-old brother, barely half her age. He allows her to work as a manager in the hospital, but he takes it for himself. She says he sees it as a mobile asset, and he spends her money on drugs and weekends at massage parlors in neighboring Bahrain. Her ex-husband refuses to let her meet their children. Her brother prevents her from completing her studies in Europe. If she complains, he threatens to hit her.
Guardianship Law - "Wallaya"
Every woman in Saudi Arabia is under the supervision of a male guardian
When there is no husband, father or brother in the vicinity, the guardian will be one of the children in the family
The women need the guardian's permission to travel outside Saudi Arabia, receive medical treatment, take out an identity card and even be released
She tried to go to court so her guardianship would be transferred to an older and more sympathetic brother, but the judge canceled the case while conducting a telephone conversation, she said. Although she dressed modestly and wore a niqab (which covers the entire face except the eyes), she thinks the judge was hostile to her because she represented herself. The help offered by the social services is poor, and shelters for battered women remind prisons of their barred windows and the ban on visitors.
When she hears other women say their brothers do not beat them, Iman assumes they are lying, "because they fear the shelters provided by the social service."
Bedouin tradition
It is estimated that the number of "escaping girls," according to Saudi terminology, is not accurate, but Mansur al-Askar, a sociologist at Iman Muhammad Ibn Saud University in Riyadh, claims that their rate is rising. He estimates that more than a thousand women escape each year from the kingdom, and many more run from Riyadh to Jeddah, the larger and more liberal coastal city.
Saudi academics who oppose the law argue that custodianship laws are not a requirement of Islam, but of Bedouin traditions still dominating Saudi Arabia. Khadijah, the first wife of the Prophet Muhammad, was a merchant who financially supported her husband. His other wives moved between Mecca and Medina without him. "Islam freed the women from the wilaya," says Hassan al-Maliki, a theologian from Riyadh who has been imprisoned several times for expressing mental independence. "A woman may choose who she will marry."
18% of women of working age are employed (compared to 65% of men)
1.9% of the lawyers are women
0.66% of the members of the local councils are women
It is estimated that over a thousand women are fleeing the country each year
* According to Economist figures, as of 2016
But the clerics who fill the judicial system see the guardians in a different way. In their view, they keep the vulnerable people in society and the integrity of the families, and as a result they maintain the integrity of society. Last December, the court sentenced one man to one year in jail for denouncing the Villaya on social networks. Another Saudi study at the University of Mecca acknowledged that some escapees may have been physically abused, but said most of them were affected by "inappropriate use of social networks, imitation of other cultures, and weak faith."
Want to read more articles?
All content is open to subscribers
Try two free weeks
Economists note that the system of guardianship reduces the wealth of Saudi Arabia. More than a quarter of the 150,000 students sent abroad by the kingdom each year are women, and since many of them are returning to their jobs or choosing to stay in more liberal places like Dubai, much of the $ 5 billion the government spends every year is lost. In a battle to preserve her talent, "says Naja al-Osaimi, a Saudi academic who has chosen to build her home in Britain.
The Hattings did not help
To the surprise of the liberals in Saudi Arabia, some of the most persistent defenders of the Villaya are women, especially in the southern provinces that reject progress, such as Asir. Although the network of fascinating enthusiasts such as StopEnslavingSaudiWomen # and IAmMyOwnGuardian #
Saudi women's cloth "and" I am my own guardian "), a social media campaign to stop the Villaya system has managed to collect only 14,000 signatures, and Saudi leaders are aware of the need to make the kingdom more friendly to women. Despite the fact that there are still men who send their photographs seeking work for their wives (and even participating in their work interviews), in 2012 the kingdom gave up on the need to obtain the guardian's approval for four types of work: selling in clothing stores, cooks and working in playgrounds. Rare to see a woman (Although they receive text message updates when they travel abroad), dress code is becoming a bit more relaxed throughout Saudi Arabia, and in the big cities women add Colors and ornaments for the traditional black dress that the state requires them to wear.In Bureida, the stronghold of Saudi puritanism, the veils that cover the women's faces have cracks in their eyes, and the headgear slide to their shoulders. Despite all this, the women are angry and frustrated. On social networks, videos showing women riding motorcycles became viral. So is a video with a silhouette of a woman holding a bottle of whiskey in her hand and dancing on the roof of her car. A black female band dressed in black sang protest songs on bumper cars, toy cars, skateboards, rollerblades, and other wheeled devices that they were permitted to obey by law. If the method does not adjust to changes, warns sociologist El Askar, it is feared that it will collapse. Judges and police must cooperate and prevent violent and depressing men from serving as guardians, he says. But to Iman, the hospital clerk, the reform can no longer wait. Her awaits a honeymoon in Australia.
http://www.haaretz.co.il/news/world/middle-east/.premium-1.3937691
translated by google
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