Last Sunday, November 20, 2022, the FIFA World Cup kicked off in Qatar. While the eyes of the world will most likely be on the teams fighting for the title, this is a good time to draw attention to the situation of women in this country.
Qatari women live under the constant control of men and do not have the right to make key decisions in their livesconcerning, for example, education, place of work, health, marriage or place of residence.
Women’s hell in Qatar has been going on for a long time and is documented by numerous reports of human rights monitoring organizations – such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. Both also alarm that after the start of the Olympics, the danger for women will increase – those working in hotels and tourist facilities may fall victim to violence or harassment.
Women in Qatar do not have basic rights
The conclusions of the 2021 Human Rights Watch report Everything I Have to Do is Tied to a Man: Women and Qatar’s Male Guardianship Rules about the plight of Qatari women are devastating. The document is 94 pages long and describes in detail the mechanism of “male tutelage” over women living in Qatar.
Women in Qatar need permission from their male guardian to get married, study abroad on a government scholarship, or work in many government jobs
– the organization emphasizes in the published document.
In addition, as mentioned above, women without the permission of the so-called male carers do not have access to certain gynecological examinations, e.g. those in the field of prenatal care. Discrimination against women in Qatar is a wide range of mechanisms that allow men to exercise complete control over every sphere of their lives.
Who is the so-called male guardian? As the name suggests, it is a woman’s male relative – father, husband, brother, grandfather or uncle – who de facto rules her life. These people decide whether a given woman can marry (and whom), take up a job or go to study abroad using a government grant. They must also consent to a woman entering or leaving the university campus, living in a dormitory or participating in study trips at any time. Human Rights Watch, based on numerous conversations with Qatari women, revealed that male carers very often block women’s development and do not agree to work or study.
Discrimination against women in Qatar. A “letter from husband” is required for work
Importantly, all discriminatory restrictions are not always dictated by the letter of the law, and often function on the basis of accepted and very deeply rooted customs. An example is the employment of women. Theoretically, a Qatari citizen does not need her husband’s consent to start work, but many companies require the so-called a “letter” from her husband or father authorizing her employment. Another act of discrimination is the huge pay gap between women and men – Qatari women on average earn much less.
After marriage, the husband becomes the male guardian of the woman. This, as activists of Human Rights Watch are alarming, creates an additional field for abuses and violence of which Qatari are victims. Moreover, women cannot decide for themselves about their material resources, finances, documents and the treatment of their own children. At any stage of her life, a male guardian can forbid her from traveling.
This bondage applies even after divorce. In Qatar, a woman cannot be the primary caretaker of children, even if she has legal custody of them. After a divorce, the offspring are usually placed under the father’s care.
A man can divorce his wife with immediate effect, while a woman must apply for a divorce in court, which is often an extremely difficult and very exhausting process. In addition, a Qatari man can marry up to four women without asking his current wife or wives for permission and without telling her/them about it.
“Male guardianship reinforces the power and control men have over women’s lives and choices”
Many Qatari women also experience hell in marriage. Human Rights Watch points out that Qatar has no law prohibiting domestic violence, and the concept of marital rape does not exist. After marriage, a woman may be labeled “disobedient” if she leaves the house without her husband’s consent or refuses to have sex “without a valid reason.”
There are also no laws against corporal punishment of children. There is also no developed system for prosecuting perpetrators of domestic violence, so when a woman decides to run away from an abusive home, she may be forcibly forced back by the police. Many Qatari women remain in this type of relationship due to the lack of any basic rights. Women’s freedom of speech in Qatar is also limited: there are no women’s rights organizations in the country.
More and more Qatari activists who managed to flee the country openly talk about the violence that affects women in this country.
Male guardianship reinforces the power and control men have over women’s lives and choices, and can foster or incite violence, leaving women with few viable options to escape abuse by family and husbands
– said Rotna Begum from Human Rights Watch, quoted by The Guardian.
Sources: The Guardian/Onet/www.hrw.org/report/2021/03/29/everything-i-have-do-tied-man/women-and-qatars-male-guardianship-rules
Source: Gazeta
Tristin is an accomplished author and journalist, known for his in-depth and engaging writing on sports. He currently works as a writer at 247 News Agency, where he has established himself as a respected voice in the sports industry.
