Lebanese Women And The Law

Can an outrage over women’s treatment in the law create successful single-issue politicians?

Photo by Lara Zankoul

So apparently, I can prevent my wife from traveling if I wanted to. I could abuse her, beat her and forcibly summon her to my home whenever I so demand. It seems the Lebanese penal code couldn’t care less about what I do in my own house. So i learned from reading this excellent article in the Daily Star by Josie Ensor and Dalila Mahdawi.

We knew it all along. The Lebanese rulebook is littered with laws that are obsolete, decrepit and outright anachronistic. Some of them are funny. For example, if you fall from the balcony on someone’s car, it’s your own fault. But the rest, like those relating to women, are not. They are unfair and very consequential. They split families, they break souls and they force many people to make difficult choices.

The matter got me thinking. We are supposedly a democracy, and if i’m not mistaken, we have more female voters than we have male ones. Why won’t Lebanese women vote in more sister lawmakers that would improve their lot?

I blame “electoral lists”, the set-menu system that encourages aspirant politicians to coalesce around zo3ama (Big Men) with big pockets/guns. This leaves us with a parliament where a handful of honchos set up the big-picture agenda and ignore the domestic mundane topics.

And yet the laws are so shocking I couldn’t help but wonder: Imagine a certain Lady XX deciding to run for elections. Now imagine her creating a clever ad campaign that exposes these individual laws (with real examples of their tragic consequences), with the simple promise: If you elect me, I will dedicate myself to changing these laws. It’s all I’m going to parliament to do, I will do nothing else.

Would I be too optimistic if I believe that Lebanon has enough sensible people to vote for her and get her elected?