Even before the first wave of SARS-CoV-2 virus had subsided in many countries, more infectious second and third waves of the virus have appeared in several places around the world, extracting a heavy toll on lives and livelihood of millions of people. Given the continuing wide disparity in distribution and dispensing of vaccines worldwide, any hopes of a rapid recovery from the pandemic and a return to ‘normal’ life appears unlikely any time soon.
The future could very well be a situation where we will have to learn to coexist with the virus, just as we have learned to live with bouts of influenza and other viruses that plague us each year. Indulging yet another virus should not be too much of a strain on our collective psyche, considering that we have become quite adept at adjusting to many viruses, especially of the social kind, such as our prevailing prejudices, discriminations and inequalities that we have long accepted as being a part of who we are.
While digesting this despondent prognosis for the future, here is another bit of pandemic-related pessimistic news. The latest Global Gender Gap Report (GGGR), published by the World Economic Forum (WEF), reveals that the COVID-19 crisis has worsened existing gender disparities worldwide. The report notes that the world will have to wait yet another generation before women gain gender parity with their male counterparts.
In a preface to its ‘GGGR 2021Insight Report’ published in March, the WEF notes that the COVID-19 pandemic raised new barriers to building inclusive and prosperous economies and societies around the world. “As the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic continues to be felt, closing the global gender gap has increased by a generation from 99.5 years to 135.6 years,” said the report authors.
The Global Gender Gap Index benchmarks gender-based gaps on four key dimensions — Economic Participation and Opportunity, Educational Attainment, Health and Survival, and Political Empowerment. The index, which tracks progress of nations towards closing these gaps over time, rates countries on a 0 to 100 scale, with higher scores indicating less distance needed to reach gender parity and lower scores showing the gap that needs to be filled to close the gender chasm.
According to the 2021 GGGR, Kuwait with a score of 62.1 percent ranked a dismal 143 out of 156 countries assessed in this year’s report. The only consolation in Kuwait’s global ranking is that other countries in the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) bloc, with the exception of the United Arab Emirates, also fared poorly in this year’s WEF index on gender parity.
The UAE came first in the GCC bloc in the GGGR 2021index with a score of 71.6 percent and a global rank of 72. Bahrain with a score of 63.2 percent and a global rank of 137 stood second in GCC, followed by Qatar with a score of 62.4 to rank 142 globally just ahead of Kuwait with its 143 rank. Oman with a score of 60.8 had a global rank of 145 and was placed above Saudi Arabia with a score of 60.3 and global rank of 147.
A detailed look at the four dimensions that comprise the GGGR index, shows that Kuwait scored high in two segments — in educational attainment,the country ranked 59 out of 156 countries with a near-perfect score of 99.7 percent; and in health and survival, Kuwait scored 96.8 percent to rank 94 among nations assessed by the WEF. However, when it came to the other two dimensions, Kuwait fared poorly, ranking 137 out of 156 countries in economic participation and opportunity with a score of 49.8 percent. In the political empowerment segment, Kuwait scored a humiliating 2.2 percent to rank 153 among the 156 countries surveyed.
Kuwait’s poor showing in political empowerment and in the economic participation and opportunity dimensions are largely a result of ingrained social and cultural gender discriminations. These imparities are largely the result of a mix of patriarchal traditions, entrenched religious orthodoxy and obdurate legal systems that have prevailed in the region for long.
Kuwait’s Constitution underlines that Islamic law (Shari’a) is the main source of legislation, yet elements of British common law, French civil law, Egyptian law and Islamic legal principles have coexisted and influenced the legal system in the country. However, the personal status law, which governs legal procedures on matters such as marriage, divorce and inheritance that come up in family court, is based on religious principles.
In addition, the laws governing familial disputes are also separate for the majority of citizens who follow Sunni school of Islam, and the 30 percent who adhere to Shiite school of Islam. Though other courts in Kuwait’s legal system consider the testimonies of men and women to be equal, in a family court the testimony of a woman is worth only half of that of a man.
In divorce proceedings, while a woman has the right to seek divorce, it is limited to a few specific reasons that include being abandoned or abused, or if the husband fails to pay alimony. Even then, the woman will have to prove injury. On the other hand, a husband can divorce his wife arbitrarily.
Similarly, while a woman has the right to inherit, the rules governing inheritance are based on the Shari’a, and differ between Sunni and Shiite Muslims. In general, however, women will inherit a smaller share than men, with a daughter’s share in inheritance often being half that accorded to her brother. Also, until recently, Kuwait had no specific law against domestic violence.
Though rape is considered a crime, marital rape is not. Although so-called ‘honor killings’ are punishable under the law, Article 153 in Kuwait’s Penal Code, deals leniantly with a man who kills his wife, mother, sister or daughter caught in ‘unlawful sexual relations’.
It was only in September 2020, that the National Assembly in Kuwait issued a new Law on Protection from Domestic Violence. The new law creates a national committee to draw up policies to combat and protect women from domestic violence, as well as submit recommendations to amend or repeal laws that contradict the new domestic violence law. The law also establishes shelters and a hotline to receive domestic violence complaints, provides counseling and legal assistance for victims, and allows for emergency protection orders (restraining orders) to prevent abusers from contacting their victim.
However, legal experts and activists say the new law has serious gaps. For instance, while it provides penalties for violating protection orders, it does not set out penalties for domestic violence as a crime on its own. While these long-demanded protections are crucial to rectifying gender anomalies and protecting women, the real test will be in ensuring implementation of its new law, filling remaining protection gaps, and emphasizing prevention, including by repealing discriminatory laws that leave women exposed to deadly violence.
Meanwhile, continued disparity in inheritance and divorce laws impair familial ties and lead to prolonged legal wranglings between parents that harm the growth and development of children caught up in the tussle. While all these shortcomings are harmful to individuals and families, it is gender bias in the nationality law that has probably caused the sharpest lacerations in the country’s social cohesiveness and inclusiveness.
According to the nationality law, Kuwaiti women married to foreign spouses cannot pass their Kuwaiti citizenship to their children or to their spouse. Only Kuwaiti men have the right to pass their citizenship to their children and to a foreign spouse. It is only under certain circumstances that a Kuwaiti woman married to a foreign spouse can transfer her citizenship to her children, such as in cases where the father has died, there has been an ‘irrevocable’ divorce, or he is ‘unknown’.
The gender discrimination in the nationality law leaves children of Kuwaiti women married to foreigners without access to state services such as free education and health coverage, and a host of other benefits that come with the privilege of being a Kuwaiti citizen. This gender bias in nationality law is also a primary cause of the ‘beidoun’ phenomena that has rankled the country since the time of its independence.
Activists and civil society organizations have long urged Kuwait to comprehensively amend the Nationality Law so as to uphold its commitment to the Constitution, and comply with its international legal obligations and commitments, including the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development adopted by the United Nations in 2015, and to which Kuwait is a signatory.
However, the continued gender discrimination in nationality flies in the face of Goal 10 in the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) that aims to reduce inequalities in income as well as those based on age, sex, disability, race, ethnicity, origin, religion or economic or other status within a country. More specifically, Target 10.3 of the UN Agenda for Sustainable Development calls on all governments to “ensure equal opportunity and reduce inequalities of outcome, including through eliminating discriminatory laws, policies and practices and promoting appropriate legislation, policies and actions in this regard”.
With an average population-weighted score of 60.9 percent, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region comprising 19 countries, including GCC states, had the largest gender gap (about 40%) yet to be closed. The progress in the region is slow, and at this prevailing pace it will take 142.4 years to close the gender gap in the region. Globally, the average distance completed to parity is at 67.7 percent, a 0.6 percentage point step back compared to 2020. This means that the average gap remaining to be close stands at 32.3 percent. On its current trajectory, estimations are that it could take 135.6 years to close the gender gap worldwide.
On a more positive note, for the twelfth-year, Iceland remained the most gender-equal country in the world having closed its gender gap to 89.2 percent as per the GGGR2021 report. Finland (86.1%) and Norway (84.9%) came in at second and third spots in the 2021 index. New Zealand (84.0%) and Sweden (82.3%) made it to the mid-tier among the top-ten countries, while Namibia (80.9%) Rwanda (80.5%) Lithuania (80.4%) Ireland (80.0%) and Switzerland (79.8%) rounded off the last five among the top ten in this year’s list.
Kuwait has worked strenuously to safeguard the health of people in the country and prevent the spread of infections. Strict restrictions imposed early on at the first signs of a global pandemic, including curtailing mobility and closing land borders, as well as sea and airports, in addition to shutting down educational establishments, entertainment and leisure venues, and limiting economic activities to only those deemed essential, have on hindsight helped control and contain the spread of the virus.
Kuwait’s relative success in mitigating the impact of the virus so far raises pertinent questions. Despite opposition from ignorance and vested interests, Kuwait has devised efficient plans and implemented them swiftly on a war-footing to combat the physical SARS-CoV-2 virus and protect the lives of people. If the country can act so resolutely and quickly to curtail a physical virus, how is it that we have remained entrenched in archaic laws, traditions and beliefs that have held us victims of ethnic, racial discriminations and gender biases for so long. More importantly, why do we allow such social viruses to continue obstructing the country’s progress and become a bane on the welfare of its people? Is it not time to build a better society for all?
– THE TIMES REPORT
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