Researching Domestic Abuse in Saudi Arabia and Morocco

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Introduction

This study analyses the responses to cases of domestic abuse as revealed in the two systems of Saudi Arabia and Morocco. Saudi Arabia’s interpretation of the law depends on the strict implementation of sharia law. Morocco’s legal system depends on the sharia law and the constitutions, the micro legal structures, social practices, social programs, and the statutes and laws of each country. Morocco has designed its legal structure to comply with the fundamental values of the people of the country. On the other hand, Saudi Arabia’s response to domestic violence is based on the strict interpretation of sharia law. In Morocco’s constitution, thirteen chapters have been devoted to the delineation of individual rights despite the promulgation of article 6 as the state’s official religion.

Definition of the offense in Morocco

The case of Amina and other women, which appeared in the news among other cases of battered women in Morocco, constitute the discourse of the case study in the context of domestic abuse and the perspectives of the cases from the sharia law and the holy Quran. On the other hand, the case of a woman who was battered in Morocco provides the foundation of investigating the criminal justice system that is based on the values of the people and the holy Quran, which however differs from Saudi Arabia’s legal system.

AP Photo/Abdeljalil.

Zohra Filali with her daughters shows a file picture of who committed suicide after forced marriage.

Abadeer (2015) notes that:

Information from our Moroccan partners illustrates the extent of the problems with the application of Article 475. One local association that works with women reported that, of 11 cases involving the rape of a minor that they handled in 2013, Article 475 was raised in 6 cases; the age of the victims ranged from 14-to 17, while the age of the rapists ranged from 23-28. The case ended in marriage between the rapist and the raped.

Definition of the offense in Saudi Arabia

A similarly defined case with that of Morocco is that of the indictment of a crime of domestic abuse in which a man was convicted of a case of attempting to use physical violence against a child and the wife in Saudi Arabia in 2014. Such cases are not rare in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia despite the ameliorations that have been done on the laws that protect vulnerable groups. However, based on the strict interpretation of the sharia law and the strict adherence to the law, it was imperative to conclude that the man was innocent because it was not possible to determine the level and amount of force that was applied to the woman and the child. The affected did not demonstrate any evidence of injuries sustained from the violent actions of the man.

Foundations of the policies and laws

In this discourse, Freamon (2003) discusses domestic violence in the context of crimes against women as perpetrated by men as opposed to a balanced approach relevant to the nurture of the judicial systems of Saudi Arabia and Morocco that strongly favor men. The foundations of the policies on which the laws of the two legal systems are defined are the cultural backgrounds of the Islamic society. However, different perceptions about the same sources of the laws (sharia) and their interpretation make them divergent in responding to cases of domestic abuse. Divergences in the context of the application of the penalties that are demanded by the law in both countries evidently emerge not only in the practical application of the law but also as stipulated in the punishment for the crimes. Here, a crime can be the same, but the laws of both countries provide different prescriptions of penalties. The rationale for focusing this study on Morocco and Saudi Arabia is justified in the argument that both countries take extreme positions in their national values, constitutions, progressivism, and conservatism when it comes to applying the sharia legal system. Morocco’s application of the sharia law is based on the interpretation of its philosophical foundation of the sharia law while Saudi Arabia adheres to the strictest interpretation and application of the sharia law based on the interpretations of the Holy Quran.

Age and gender differences

The legal systems of both countries do not discriminate on age, but the differences in gender arise in the ways cases of domestic abuse are dealt with because of the inherent bias towards women, children, and girls. The key similarities of legal systems of dealing with domestic violence between Morocco and Saudi Arabia are both established on Islamic beliefs as the state religion but differ on how religion is embedded into the values of the people and the legal structures of the country. In Morocco, some articles and sources of law are not indigenous. On the other hand, Saudi Arabia fully embraces an integrated sharia law as the official law no the land in dealing with domestic violence. Each of the laws is spelled in the constitution as derived from the sharia law, which implies that sharia law is the extreme law of the land.

According to Abadeer (2015), there are strong gender differences in the application of the laws that protect people from the effects of domestic abuse. Both countries do not embrace the idea that women could be abused domestically. The basis of the interpretation of the sharia law in Saudi Arabia is the Holy Quran, which allows for the beating of women despite the shortcoming of how to interpret the law on what constitutes a beating and the weight of the physical force to be applied on the woman. The fact entails a revision of the laws on the basis used for the interpretation of various clauses to ensure that the rights of the women are upheld.

How big is the problem?

There is evidence that shows that 50% of women around the world are subjected to domestic violence from their intimate partners. The problem is big in both Saudi Arabia and Morocco calling for urgent intervention. It is evident that international law protects women from being abused by their intimate partners as defined in the principles of human rights that revolve around women genital mutilation and privacy violations. A discrepancy of international law appears in the laws on gender violence and the protection of women in the Moroccan legal structures. This is evident in the jurisprudence of how women’s testimonies are rated because such evidence carries only half the weight of a man’s testimony. That is in addition to the aggrandizing of women to seek the assistance of male counterparts in seeking medical care in the case of injury that is caused by their male counterparts in Saudi Arabia’s legal system. Here, it is not easy to collect evidence of abuse because of the express prohibition in the Moroccan law to do so. Besides, the reliance on male witnesses or chaperones makes further complications on how the police collect evidence to incriminate the offender. It is also evident that the Moroccan legal system does not allow cases of violence against women to leave homes, making it almost impossible to collect enough statistics on how domestic abuse is dealt with in law. Besides, it is difficult for women to press charges against their male intimate partners because it is based on the concept of shame or dishonor. The rationale is that women who accuse their male counterparts are assumed to wash their dirty linen in public, which invites social pressure that impedes the administration of justice.

On the other hand, the Saudi legal system has embedded the interpretation of the law on violence against women on the strict interpretation of the sharia law and the holy Quran. However, international treaties and laws on violence against women, the universal declaration of human rights, and the international cultural rights convention and elimination of all forms of discrimination are critical legal elements that are not asserted in the sharia law (Al-Hibri 2003). However, an interpretation of the holy Quran on which the sharia law is strictly based forms an integrated component of Saudi Arabia’s legal system, which seems to condone violence by asserting that women should remain subordinate to their husbands. However, strict interpretations of the verses in the holy Quran show that the book shuns violence. Some verses seem to strongly support discrimination against women.

It is imperative to conclude that Saudi Arabia’s legal framework supports violence against women based on the strict interpretation of the sharia law besides the failure of the government to codify the family law on violence against women as is the case of Morocco. Besides, there is no evidence that supports the police to intervene in the case of a man beating or abusing his wife in Saudi Arabia. However, in Morocco, it is possible for an intervention to be done on the premise that the law has been codified and the interpretation of the sharia law is based on the values of the people. Here, the similarity between Saudi Arabia and Morocco is that they rely on the sharia law and the Quran as the source of law, but the differences emerge in the way those laws are interpreted and applied in cases of domestic violence. However, international law specifically opposes the way both countries interpret and rely on sharia law to administer justice in cases of domestic abuse. Saudi Arabia places emphasis on the traditional laws for social stability because women are not encouraged to leave their husbands as it could disrupt the social structure. On the other hand, Morocco depends on the national values to interpret the sharia law to punish those people who practice gender violence.

Need for legislation

It is evident that due to international pressure and evidence of the depth to which violence against women can happen in Saudi Arabia, the country has taken positive steps in legislating violence against women as a punishable crime. Examples abound of situations where pictures of battered wives have been circulated on social media, which made significant contributions to the enactment of the laws that prohibit violence and uphold the rights of women in Saudi Arabia’s legal system. That is asides from the intense pressure and examples of males battering their wives up to the point of injuring them as was the case of Rania al-Baz, the Saudi Arabian television presenter in 2008, who was severely beaten by her husband to the point of injuring her face. The government of Saudi Arabia enacted a law to prevent the battering of women. It is stipulated in law under article 19 that a person proved guilty of the criminal offense of battering a woman can be subjected to a fine of not less than 50,000 riyals (US$13,000) with repeated offenses attracting double the amount stipulated in the law.

Article 9 upholds family values and directs that observance of the rules of the Holy Quran, which is the source of the legal system of Saudi Arabia, provides the foundation and framework on which other laws are expressed and practiced. The article expressly requires that people should show obedience to God and to His Prophet and to the rulers and the laws of the land (Dickenson-Jones, Hyslop & Vaira-Lucero 2014). Interpretation of the requirement revolves around what the holy Quran terms as gender disparity in dealing with men and women as the discourse on the interpretation of the sharia law, which is the source of the country’s judicial system. However, the law criminalizes offenses that are classified as sexual, physical, or psychological. While in the context of the law, Saudi Arabia provides a limited interpretation of the law and its settings, the international law on gender abuse spans the forms of exploitation such as sexual abuse, bodily or psychological abuse, and bodily or physical violence. Intervention can be sought from unspecified government agencies in the case of domestic abuse in the provision of adequate health services and legal protection.

Current reforms

On the other hand, the Moroccan system’s penal code, whose reform is underway, does not provide explicit protection for women who have suffered domestic abuse. The impediment to the enactment and implementation of the law is based on the premise that international law should not contradict sharia law, which as earlier shown does not form the foundation of the legal system of government and gender-based laws in Morocco, which derives its laws from the values of the people and the societies. The contradiction is evident because one side of the requirement in Morocco’s legal system is that compliance with international law is possible on the ground that it does not contradict the sharia law. On the other hand, no strict adherence to the sharia law happens when it comes to the enactment of the laws on violence against women. It is imperative to note that cases of violence such as rape in Morocco do not count as criminal cases against the offender because the sharia law recognizes sex as an act that is allowed only between a man and a woman who are legally married.

Policies and practices in view of national and international laws

Criminal justice systems are different from one country to another and the sources of laws follow suit. Johnson and Vriens (2011) present evidence of countries such as Saudi Arabia and Morocco which rely on sharia law to enact criminal laws as embedded in article 7 of Saudi Arabia’s laws of governance as well as expressed in chapter three of the basic law of governance. A divergent approach is used in Morocco where a weak legal system prevails in the criminalization of domestic abuse, which shows a bias towards women. This is evident in cases reported on the human rights watchdogs, which showed that 62.8 percent of women suffered domestic violence in the form of psychological, sexual, or economic violence without the legal intervention of the police, courts, or prosecutors despite the premise that the country’s legal system strictly adheres to the sharia law and the value systems of the people (Azzahrani 2016). That is despite the enactment of the violence against women’s bill in Morocco. Several case studies attest to a weak system that fails to protect women against the violence meted on them by men. It is evident that Saudi Arabia has enacted laws that criminalize domestic abuse in providing legal protection for women. In the international context, the UN declarations and treaties such as the 1966 social and cultural rights conventions prohibit sex discrimination by noting that violence against women is an extreme case of abuse.

Contemporary issues in an international context

There is evidence that shows that violence against both men and women happens in different families in the world with the largest share affecting women than men. The laws that protect women suffering from domestic abuse span the international landscape and not merely one country. However, the interpretation of what constitutes domestic violence differs from one country to the other. Besides that, the lack of legal professionals trained in handling cases of domestic violence is an area that needs to be focused on because most countries handle such cases as normal criminal offenses despite the complexity associated with them. For instance, in Saudi Arabia, the interpretation of domestic violence that in most cases affects women more than men is based on the teachings of the Holy Quran. On the other hand, Morocco’s interpretation of domestic violence is based on both the values of the people along the Quran. In the international scene, western countries interpret violence using the secular law and the values of the people, which departs from the interpretations that are based on the holy Quran or the sharia law.

Merits and demerits of methods of explaining crime and punishment

Different methods are used by different countries to define their legal systems in addressing issues of domestic violence against men, women, and children or those who are in intimate relationships. For instance, those counties which rely on the sharia law as the framework for interpreting domestic violence and the penal codes have their merits and demerits. Crime in the context of the Islamic jurisdiction and the form of punishment meted on the offenders significantly differ among different systems. Hitting a woman according to the sharia law is allowed as derived from the Surah An-Nisa, 34 of the holy Quran (Abadeer 2015). Besides the enforcement of the laws differ significantly across different countries. It is imperative to note that the disagreement that arises in explaining the interpretation of the clause that allows wife-beating as a form of punishment is acceptable in sharia law. This is a serious demerit as the interpretation of the law does not provide protection for women but tends to protect those who violate the universal declaration of human rights.

Conclusion

Despite the legal systems showing divergence views in the administration of justice in Saudi Arabia and Morocco, the Saudi Arabia system has attracted several changes due to international outcry, but the criminal justice system of Morocco is still weak and should be addressed under the international law that stipulates the need to observe universal rights of human beings. In both case studies, evidence shows that none of the two systems provided justice to the affected women, which calls for an overhaul of the criminal justice systems.

References

Abadeer, A S 2015, Measuring Gender Discrimination. In Norms and Gender Discrimination in the Arab World, vol. 1, no. 2, pp. pp. 149-166.

Al-Hibri, A Y 2003, Islamic Perspective on Domestic Violence, An. Fordham Int’l LJ, vol. 1, no. 27, pp. 195.

Azzahrani, M 2016, Saudi Women’s Perceptions and Legal Awareness of their Human Rights. Proceedings of the Eighth Saudi Students Conference in the UK, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 173-184.

Dickenson-Jones, G, Hyslop, D & Vaira-Lucero, M 2014, Estimating the Global Costs of Violence. Business, Peace and Sustainable Development, vol. 2, no. 2014, pp. 6-27.

Freamon, B K 2003, Martyrdom, Suicide, and the Islamic Law of War: A Short Legal History. Fordham International Law Journal, vol. 1, no. 27, pp. 299-369.

Johnson, T & Vriens, L 2011, Islam: governing under Sharia. Council on Foreign Relations, vol. 1, no. 24, pp. 1-6.

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