Claiming Equal Citizenship

By Meris Lutz
The Daily Star (Lebanon)
Wednesday, March 08, 2006

International Women’s Day

BEIRUT: “Hi, I’m Rana. This is my daughter - she’s Norwegian,” the young woman said, gently bouncing the baby on her lap as she passed out fliers reading “My nationality: a right for me and my family” at AUB on Tuesday. Rana Issa is Lebanese; her daughter was born in Lebanon, but because Issa’s husband is Norwegian, her daughter will never hold Lebanese nationality, since Lebanese law actually prevents women from extending their nationality to their children. “My personal opinion is that if you don’t address women’s concerns, you’re not going to change anything, sectarian differences or anything,” Issa said. “This doesn’t affect every woman in the country, but in principle it does; it affects a woman’s value in the law.”

Issa, who is pursuing her masters in literature, became involved with the Women’s Rights Club when she heard it was co-sponsoring a women’s nationality rights campaign with the Collective for Research and Training on Development-Action (CRTD-A) in honor of Women’s Day on March 8.

CRTD-A will be setting up booths in the ABC Mall, Achrafieh, and in Hamra Square during the day on Wednesday, as well as joining the AUB Women’s Rights Club in sponsoring a panel discussion on the issue at AUB’s West Hall at 5 p.m.

Issa described her own experience facing the difficulties of a mixed-nationality marriage.

“After she [my daughter] was born, we wanted to go back to Norway to visit his family,” she said. “We didn’t know we needed an exit visa for her, so when we got to the airport they said, ‘you can leave, but she stays here.’ They didn’t care that her mother was Lebanese.”

In addition to the legal discrimination regarding passports and access to state services like health care and education, Issa must deal with the negative stigma attached to Lebanese women who marry non-Lebanese men.

“I am treated by the officials as a fallen women for getting married to a foreigner. They say, ‘why didn’t you marry a Lebanese, aren’t Lebanese men good enough for you?’” she said.

Issa’s husband works as a freelance journalist since his foreign resident status prevents him from getting a job.

The foreign wife of a Lebanese man can apply for citizenship one year after their marriage.

Roula Masri, a gender program officer with the CRTD-A, said the Lebanese government has already signed several international human rights conventions, such as the United Nation’s Convention to Eliminate Discrimination Against Women, but refused to ratify articles explicitly calling for equal nationality rights for men and women.

“We want to change just two words of this law to say ‘a child is born Lebanese of a Lebanese father or mother,’ just two words,” she said.

According to Masri, the Lebanese government doesn’t want to amend the law because it might upset the Muslim-Christian ratio and open the floodgates to Palestinian refugees.

Masri described the arguments as hypocritical, since the same arguments could be made against a man’s ability to pass on his nationality.

She also said the student response to the campaign has been enthusiastic, and she was surprised at how many people were unaware of the law.

“There are students mobilizing each other, men and young guys calling to other students, ‘come sign the petition, it’s for women’s rights!’” she said, laughing and beckoning with her arms. “We had as many men as women.”

Copyright (c) 2006 The Daily Star

Entry Filed under: Countries, Lebanon, Activities, In the News