Dearth, loopholes in ‘outdated’ laws
the personal status law was promulgated 40 years ago, and like most of our laws, especially the very old ones, it suffers from many deficiencies and loopholes, and is out of date!
for instance, a court verdict was recently issued where the judge did not dismiss the senior official accused of slapping a security man working at a private sector company. instead, the judge was content to punish the senior official by blaming him.
the ruling sparked controversy and received a lot of criticism, and by questioning it became clear that the law did not give the judge many options regarding the way to deal with the “senior government employee”, as he had the choice of either to dismiss or fi nd guilty the convicted aggressor and no third option between the two were available.
since the crime did not result in major damage that requires the senior official to be dismissed, the judge had nothing to do but enforce the second available penalty.
many individuals complain about the tough and unfixable personal status law in kuwait, which is enforced on non-muslim individuals, either citizens or foreigners. this law requires an integrated amendment. the united arab emirates has recently conducted a comprehensive amendment of personal status law and it was enforced by february 1, 2023. the law included many articles most dominant of them are:
■ the testimony of a non-muslim man, regardless of his religion, is equal to that of a woman.
■ the man’s share of the inheritance is equal to the woman’s share.
■ a civil marriage contract requires only the consent of both parties, that is, the man and the woman.
■ both the man and the woman may request a divorce by their own will, without the need to provide justification, explain the damages, or present the divorce to government committees.
■ the law regulates “joint custody of children”, in which the man and woman have equal custody rights until the child reaches the age of 18.
■ the alimony for the divorced woman is determined based on several factors, including the number of years of marriage, and the age of the wife at the time of divorce, so that the alimony increases with the increase of her age, in addition to the wife’s desire to take care of the children or not, taking other matters into account, including the financial condition of the spouses.
■ the paternity of the child is established by the express acknowledgment of the father and mother.
■ and other necessary and humanitarian regulations and rules.
it is unfortunate and sad in kuwait that these rights are not clear, is dealt with arbitrarily, and are often subject to the mood and desire of the concerned director in the ministry of justice, where the regulations become stricter with his strictness, and become flexible with his flexibility.
for example, baha’is, whether citizens or others are not entitled to dispose of the inheritance of their inheritor, especially if it is in the form of property or shares in companies or business dealings, except after a ruling is issued by the relevant court.
it takes a long time for a such verdict to be issued, a matter which delays the heirs from obtaining their rights. if we have competent government ministers and lawmakers, except for a few lawmakers, we did not need to write this sort of article.
