Justice Ginsburg Praises Tunisian Women in Politics

On February 4th, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Joan Bader Ginsburg paid an official visit to the American embassy in Tunis. Ginsburg encouraged women participation in politics but haled the presence of female membership in the Constituent Assembly as they represent 25 percent of the members of the parliament. Ginsburg spoke with a number of Tunisian political personalities during her trip, giving particular attention to the female representatives in the Constituent Assembly. She met Vice-President of the Tunisian Constituent Assembly and representative of Ennahda, Mehrezia Laabidi, who complained about the lack of attention of the media on women participation in the Constituent Assembly. Ginsburg also met Selma Baccar MP from the opposition party Progressive Democratic Party (PDP) who denounced the “quasi-monopoly of Ennahda female members within the Constituent Assembly,” as they are 42 on 49 female MPs, and added  that women’s “participation in hearings of the Constituent Assembly and in political life in general, remains important – given the quality of their participation.”

The role to give to the women in politics is debated in an Arab world under democratic process. Libya proposed a quota of ten per cent of the seats, when Libyan’s women organizations demanded for between 40 and 50 percent in the national assembly, which will be elected in June 2012. Tunisia’s interim government required that half of all names on a party’s list be women. Moreover Ennahda, the party that has a majority of seats in the Tunisian Constituent Assembly, has promised to not change  the Code of Personal status which has been enshrined in Tunisian law since 1957 and guarantees equality between women and men in a number of areas, such as divorce, abolishes polygamy.