'Silent majority'

Survey shows strong opposition to proposed amendments to Iraq’s Personal Status Law

2024-08-17 | 20:35

BAGHDAD — A survey conducted by the Iraq Polling Team has found that a significant majority of Iraqis, 73.2%, “strongly oppose” the proposed amendments to Iraq’s Personal Status Law No. 188 of 1959. The survey, which gathered responses from 61,648 participants nationwide from August 13 to August 15, 2024, revealed that only 23.8% of participants “strongly supported” the amendments, while 3.1% expressed “indifference.”

The proposed amendments would allow individuals to choose whether family matters should be governed by religious authorities or the civil judiciary. Critics argue that such changes could undermine rights related to inheritance, divorce, and child custody, and potentially remove the minimum marriage age for Muslim girls, which is currently set at 18 under the existing law.

Saadoun Mohsen Damad, who supervised the survey, stressed the importance of this data, stating, “The purpose of this survey is to reach the opinions of Iraqis, away from the debates on social media, which do not reveal the true views of the silent majority. These views are not accessible to the Iraqi legislators due to the absence of such academic research activities.”

The first reading of these controversial amendments was held by the Iraqi parliament on August 4, sparking protests in several cities across Iraq. Damad further noted, “Amending the Personal Status Law is one of the amendments with widespread effects, and it is important for such legislative activities to be based on the opinions of the citizens or voters concerned.”

The Shia Coordination Framework, Iraq’s largest parliamentary bloc, supports the amendments, promoting them as offering “freedom of choice.” In contrast, a new parliamentary bloc composed of female members from various political factions has been formed specifically to oppose these changes.

Furthermore, the survey showed that 81.6% of respondents prefer the Personal Status Law to maintain a civil character, while 18.4% favored a sectarian religious approach.

In terms of sampling, the largest group of respondents was aged between 46-60 years old, making up 29.2% of participants, while the smallest age group was those aged 18-25, representing only 8.3%. Geographically, 85.4% of responses came from within Iraq, with 9.5% participating from abroad. Baghdad recorded the highest participation rate at 48.1%, followed by Basra at 11.7%. Among the respondents, 72.8% were married and 12.7% were unmarried.

A coalition of prominent Iraqi women from academic, media, artistic, and literary circles, both within Iraq and abroad, has also issued a joint statement rejecting the proposed amendments and has called on the public to sign a petition to oppose these changes.