signed by children of Lebanese mothers and foreign fathers.

For a country arguably famed of being the region’s democratic & tolerant, Lebanon is not that advanced or different when it comes to promoting women’s rights, especially in the citizenship field. Lebanese women cannot pass on their nationality to their children according to Lebanese nationality law, except when their father dies while they are still minors. If the father passes away when they are adults, the children are considered foreigners, which creates many problems if they decide to live in Lebanon,because they need residency and work permits. On the other hand, men who marry foreign women automatically transfer their nationality to their children. Consequently, thousands of children in Lebanon are required to pay regular residency permit fees and face serious obstacles entering the job market and obtaining affordable education or healthcare.

Let’s talk numbers. Women make up about 53 percent of the population - around two million citizens - while research by the Collective for Research and Training on Development Action (CRTDA) found that women aged 23-34 outnumber men by seven to one, because most young men are employed abroad. 



Most women receive a good education in Lebanon. Half of all university students are women, making them more competitive. According to UNDP’s Gender & Citizenship Initiative, Lebanese women comprise 29% of the workforce, a relatively elevated percentage compared to other Arab countries. Working women seem to be more educated than their male counterparts, as education tends to be a prerequisite for women entering the labor force.

But, to this date & time, Lebanese women are not recognized as equal citizens, despite their many contributions to their direct families, respective communities & country. Although Lebanon has technically participated in the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, it has yet to approve the implementation of the convention’s resolutions. Lebanon’s problem is, like many other Middle Eastern countries, related to women’s equal rights to nationality.

The nationality law was established in 1925 and partially reformed in 1994. The end product is not yet satisfactory. A more comprehensive reform to the nationality law has become trapped in the political issue of the presence of 400,000 Palestinian refugees in Lebanon & the “balanced” sectarian representation system. Some politicians & many fellow citizens have argued that to allow Lebanese women to nationalize the children they have with non-Lebanese, namely Palestinians & other Arabs, would be to shake up the delicate sectarian demographic on which the country’s political system is founded. Few of the opposing policymakers set a specific condition: They would only support a change in the law if Lebanese are given the same treatment by other Arab countries - a condition not likely to be met.

Let’s have another look at the numbers. According to a research undertaken by CRTDA, Arabs represented the largest proportion of foreign husbands (61.5 percent). They were mostly Egyptians (23 percent), followed by Jordanians (18 percent), and Iraqis (10 percent). Meanwhile, Syrians (3.5 percent) and Palestinians (2 percent) constituted only a small proportion of foreign husbands. Among the non-Arab husbands, the French predominated, representing eight per cent of foreign husbands.

This is simply an example of the sexist approach of the society.  “Apparently, one’s nationality only comes from the power of sperm”, as one activist puts it. To recap, Lebanese law allows male citizens married to foreigners to pass their nationality onto their wives and children, but does not permit the same for Lebanese women. While no law states that a Lebanese man cannot confer his nationality to his Palestinian wife for instance, I wonder why the authorities are not equally afraid of disrupting the fragile sectarian political system or the “implantation” of the Palestinian refugees. While we as women are becoming more integrated & involved in the social & economic progress & developments, we’re not yet treated as full citizens; Our children still don’t “qualify” for citizenship.

Another shocking piece of information I ran into while reading about the subject is that women of the 19^th century - under the ottoman rule -  had better rights than us. Imagine that in the 1800s, women in Lebanon, as their counterparts in the rest of the ottoman empire, had a relatively independent civil status. Passing on the ottoman nationality to her children when they’re born on ottoman soil is not their only privilege. “Enjoying an independent entity and full legal capacity even after marriage, the Ottoman wife was entitled to keep whatever property she had before entering into a marriage contract, and to have sole possession and control over any acquisition she makes while being married. In fact, the Ottoman wife was able to enter into contractual agreements and enjoyed the freedom to use the court system in order to secure her rights independently of her husband (or anyone else for that matter)”, argues Mida R Zantout, an academic staff at McGill University in an article she wrote to the Daily Star last August. However, under the French mandate, independent Lebanon adopted many French laws (modernization!!), namely the Code Napoleon (a law no longer applied in France since 1960), which basically denies women many rights. Under this law, women are not allowed to travel without the consent of her husband (sounds familiar??), incapable of signing contracts or working without permission & don’t have equal access to education among other things. In other words, this law makes women as legally incapable as the criminals, the mentally challenged & the minors.

How can our politicians & policymakers maintain that Lebanon is the main example of democracy, diversity & tolerance in the Arab world, when its citizens are still not treated equally whether because of gender, religion or class… or when 53% of the population is treated as second-class citizens? Do our women parliamentarians forget that they’re discriminated against when their main job is to make policies & amend laws?.. or they’re there because of a man’s influence in the first place, hence their priority is answering to this someone’s expectations rather than fighting for their rights?

Anyway, that’s a whole different dilemma.. The real issue lies in a certain Lebanese “paranoia” of the “other”..

If nothing, let’s unite at least on a gender basis. As women, we should demand our fellow citizens & our respective policymakers to look into this issue as a lawful right for equal citizens, who carry out their duties as Lebanese & as productive citizens; rather than seeing the whole situation through such a narrow sectarian or patriarchal & sometimes even racist perspective.

For information about the nationality campaign:

http://www.crtda.org.lb/

To support the campaign & have updates, you can join the cause on facebook: http://apps.facebook.com/causes/17486?m=7b092837

Or sign the petition:

 http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/help-Women-in-MEA-get-citizenship-rights