Tunisian women shout slogans and hold posters reading, "don't touch my rights" and "woman is the future of man" during a protest calling for the respect of women's rights and other fundamental rights in Tunis, Tunisia, August 13, 2012. Fauque Nicolas/ABACA/Press Association Images. All rights reserved.
#NoWomanNoFly was the hashtag that concluded
2017 in Tunisia; a year that witnessed historical women’s rights reforms.
The Tunisian Parliament approved a landmark law on violence against women which, unprecedently, included
progressive provisions on domestic violence and marital rape.
The president ordered the abolishment of a
decades-long ban on Tunisian women marrying non-Muslim men, and called for
equal inheritance laws.
Women’s rights, the state, and political instrumentalization
All of these reforms and legislations, specifically lifting the
restrictions on women’s marriage to non-Muslims, consolidated Tunisia’s
position as the leading Arab Muslim country on women’s rights and gender
equality.
However, Tunisian activists have approached these reforms with scepticism, highlighting not only their
problematic timing (coming directly after the passing of a highly unpopular
amnesty bill) but also the state's continued tradition of instrumentalizing
women’s rights for its own political purposes.
The complexities of the Tunisian
political and social landscape
President Essebsi has held positions
of power in the Tunisian political landscape for the past six decades. Just like
his pre-revolution predecessors, he uses selective feminism and women’s rights
to weaken political opponents, manipulate public opinion and mask the
government’s complete disregard for the demands of the Tunisian revolution.
The timing of this sudden
attentiveness to women’s rights was carefully calculated. By lifting the ban on
interfaith marriages, he knew all too well how to draw local and international
attention away from the nefarious reconciliation bill.
And by calling for equal inheritance
laws a few months before the now-postponed local elections, Essebsi was able to
put Ennahda in a difficult position: support him and risk losing a significant
number of voters, oppose him and risk alienating another portion of Tunisian
society and losing international support.
It is unrealistic to believe that
patriarchy in Tunisia would be toppled overnight, especially by a president who
has a history of insulting and patronizing women.
Maybe the most well-known example is
Essebsi’s response to a journalist’s question concerning the then-vice
president of the National Constituent Assembly’s, Mehrziya Laabidi, public
criticism of him as prime minister. He retorted: “what can I say, she is just a woman.”
Essebsi’s dismissiveness of such a senior
politician caused outrage. This was by no means the only incident.
In 2011, he replied to
a journalist’s question by asking her about her age and condescendingly calling
her “my child”, causing the other men around him to burst out in laughter.
An equally alarming comment was made
in 2011 during an interview on an Egyptian talk show when the state figure referred to women who
wear the niqab as “crows.”
The marginalization of women’s
rights
With these facts in mind, it should
be noted that the international community is also guilty of selective feminism.
Western governments have long been aware of and, not only silent but, often
complicit in extensive human rights violations committed by their allies in the
region, which include discrimination against women. Saudi Arabia is a prime
example.
Because of international interest in
Saudi Arabia’s vast oil reserves and geostrategic position, flags were lowered
in the United Kingdom and flew at half-mast in Australia when King Abdullah
passed away in 2015.
Barack Obama referred to US/Saudi relations as “warm and genuine”, and the IMF's Christine
Lagarde praised the leader of the only country in the world where women were not
allowed to drive cars as a "strong advocate for women."
In a similar fashion, France’s stance
towards Tunisia’s dictatorship was shaped by its strong economic ties to its
former colony. In that context, it was not surprising when former President
Jacques Chirac praised Tunisia as “a
pole of stability and peace” then announced an increase in the financial aid in
1995, while conveniently failing to mention the dreadful human rights violations.
The US also kept silent in the face
of gross violations, state oppression and persecution of women, backing
the Ben Ali regime because of its cooperation in
the “war on terror” and the 2003 Anti-Terrorism Law.
Before the revolution, Circular 108 prevented women from the right to wear the hijab in public
institutions, which led to decades of state harassment, imprisonment and
persecution. International NGOs such as Oxfam turned a blind eye towards the struggles of thousands of hijab-wearing women under the Ben Ali regime, never denouncing the dictator’s anti-hijab policies.
While thousands of women were being
deprived of their basic rights, ATFD issued a statement in 2003 expressing their “profound concern about the spread of the
head-scarf in the country”, questioning “the state’s responsibility in the
spread of this phenomenon” and stating that the government’s “policy concerning
women and the place of religion in society is ambitious and marked by the
absence of a clear political position concerning the hijab.”
Tunisian women are often exploited by
companies, especially in the textile industry under Law 1972,
where they are employed with low wages and short-term contracts to appeal to
foreign investors. This also did not make headlines.
However, foreign activists and
western media were quick to celebrate the legal reform granting Tunisian women
the choice to marry non-Muslim men, coining it as empowering. But do all
Tunisian women feel empowered?
The truth is, even though the repeal
of the 1973 decree is a crucial step, these state-led reforms overlook
questions of class and marginalize other important women’s struggles – those of
the Tunisian women who are never on the political agenda and who never dream of
making it to international news.
In May 2017, a group of unemployed
women in Sidi Bouzid, the majority of whom have higher education degrees,
started “The Feminine Movement of Menzel Bouzayane” demanding employment opportunities and a chance to preserve their
dignity.
The women of the movement held a
sit-in front of the municipality for several months, and organized a march from
their town to the governorate of Sidi Bouzid (around 80 km) under the slogan “Manich Sekta” (I won’t stay quiet).
When the President proposed
repealing decree 73 for the first time in August, eighteen of the protesters
were on hunger strike because the government was not responding to their plight. This
apparently was not picked up by international media.
The “Manich Sekta” movement is a
painful reminder that there are women who suffer from inequality,
marginalization and exclusion, yet the ugliness of their reality was completely
eclipsed by this internationally-attractive reform in marriage customs.
Talking to several young women who
work in a textile factory in the coastal city of Nabeul, I was reminded of the
plight of working class women. Their complaints were the same: salaries are much
lower than the legal minimum wage, a lack of social insurance and in some
cases, sexual harassment in the work place.
These women, and thousands of
others, would understandably be indifferent to Essebsi’s reforms. The political
elite choose ignore the real struggles.
Addressing issues of farmer land ownership and access by women in rural areas,
assuring equal pay, job security, health insurance and dignity in the work
place are simply not as appealing as certain religiously-controversial reforms.
Nabeul, like Sousse and Monastir, is
one of the lucky coastal cities that has been fairly developed by both the
pre-revolution and current regime. However, southern regions have been
neglected and women have not been included in the reform process. The
government has instead focused on polarizing issues for political gains.
Further reforms
and a continuing trend
Recently, the committee for
individual liberties and equality have introduced proposals in favour of abolishing the “Mahr” clause (dowry) in marriage contracts, the right to adopt either the
mother’s or father’s last name and the option of gender-equal inheritance.
Specific details of this proposal
have yet to be revealed. The mahr, an amount of money given by the groom to the
bride when signing the marriage contract, is merely symbolic in Tunisia. Of
course, the reasoning behind its symbolism is highly problematic, as it
confirms the husband’s place as the head of the family and the financial
provider and insinuates certain expectations of the wife in exchange for such
“payment.”
However, in practice, the act itself
does not carry any weight, legal or otherwise, and is often set at one Tunisian
Dinar. The practices of state institutions are what carry weight.
Safaa, a high school teacher in
Tunis, recently became a mother. While registering her daughter at the National
Fund for Health Insurance (CNAM), she was informed that she was not allowed to
and the child would have to be registered under her father’s insurance. “It’s
like she’s not equally my daughter,” says Safaa.
State institutions have a tendency
of establishing pseudo-laws that turn mothers into second-class citizens.
According to Safaa, official student school documents always require the
father’s signature. If the student shows up with a mother’s signature, they may
be asked to provide proof of their father’s absence.
The fight for women’s rights in
Tunisia tends to be mistakenly perceived as a battle between a secular state
and religious thinkers.
The Committee for Individual Liberties and Equality was launched in 2017, and seems to follow the same trends. When it
comes to women’s marginalization, the majority of the reforms disregard the
role of the state and only focus on religiosity and conservatism.
The ground-breaking law on violence against women of July 2017 has undeniably
revolutionized women’s rights legislation in the Arab world. However, it will
need adequate funding and commitment for its full implementation.
Without the full support of all
state institutions and real political will, it will not make a difference in
women’s daily struggles.
The reforms
that took place are needed and important, but they should be part of a more
inclusive approach of integrating and empowering all women, not just those of a
certain class or region. In other words, not just women who fall under the
state’s definition of a modern Tunisian woman.
By ignoring the Tunisian public sphere and aggrandizing Essebsi’s role in liberating women, Tunisian and foreign media’s Orientalist
approach to Tunisian feminism has been exposed.
The
socio-economic dimensions of women’s struggles have yet again been marginalized
and forgotten, and attention is undeniably deflected from the structural
transformations required for real revolutionary change.
