En ny familielov i det vestafrikanske land vurderes at forværre kvinders rettigheder betydeligt. Piger bliver gift, fra de er 16 og skal adlyde mændene. 69 pct. af kvinder mellem 15 og 24 er analfabeter.
In the strongly patriarchal society in Mali, many women need to ask permission from their husbands just to leave the house, women’s groups have been pushing for change for the last 10 years, British daily “The Guardian” reports Tuesday.
The hopes of women activists were pinned to a new Family Code to strengthen the legal rights of women. Its provisions included raising the minimum legal age of marriage for girls, improving women’s inheritance (arverettigheder) and property rights and removing the clause demanding a wife’s obedience to her husband.
The law was adopted by the National Assembly in August 2009 but was withdrawn following uproar from conservative Muslim groups.
Provocative headlines in newspapers warned that women would no longer have to obey their husbands and thousands took to the streets in protest.
According to Safiatou Doumbia, a member of the Malian Association for Care and Assistance to Women and Children, the new law has set women back.
“The new law brings women’s rights back to more than 50 years ago because some rights women had in the former law have been banned.
Before, a woman would automatically keep her children if her husband died. This is not the case with the new law, which allows a family counsel to decide who should keep the children.”
Under the new Family Code, as in the original 1962 law, a woman must obey her husband, men are considered the head of the family and the legal age for marriage is 16 for girls, and 18 for boys.
