When Expensive Dowry Blocks Marriage [Archives:2001/09/Culture]

Naser Ali Al-Taweeli
It is one of the biggest problems facing Yemeni youths. It is a very bad social phenomenon which has given rise to many negative consequences. Many a youth has taken up illegal ways as they find it impossible to lead a decent life with the girls they want to marry due to the high dowry asked by many families of the girls.
In this article, we shed light on this social problem and reflect some views of some youths.
Sonia Abdullah Shuja’a al-Din said “God has created both man and woman to be complementary for each other. They can not live separately. Therefore, Islam has recommended marriage and pushed Muslims to marry each other. Our prophet, our good and ideal example, married his daughter for an iron ring. He has also married another Muslims for some verses from the Holy Qura’an. However, in the present time our society suffers from the high dowry families ask. The greed of some parents has gone beyond all words can describe. They ask for high amounts of money that most of youths can never afford. These parents look at their daughters as a commodity.
The strict attitudes of parents in this regard has lead to perversion and the spread of immoral practices among many youths. Consequently, girls are not married except to a well to do person or to an aged man whose number is up. Youths find themselves helpless in such a situation. Therefore they prefer to travel abroad and look for job opportunities. Most of them stay there and marry foreigners. I don’t think that there can be solutions for this phenomenon which has become a part of our culture and conventions.”
Ahmad Moqbil al-Asri “The expensive dowry and other requirements of the girl’s family are not at all affordable. I am an example of those youths who could not marry because of these never ending requirements imposed by artificial conventions including parties, clothes, lunch party, Qat, money for the mother, etc. Due to all these requirements I had to leave the girl I loved and I travelled away. These requirements do put obstacles in the face of youths to marry and lead a stable life. Due to these obstacles many youths may be led a stray and lead a perverted life.
Abduldaiem Muqbil Nouman says that solutions for this problem are represented in that the society is divided into three main segments: the well-to-do segment, the middle class and the lower segment.. Through this division the economic level of living is defined.. the main problems in this respect are economic. The duty of Islamic law in the question of marriage is to follow dictations and teachings of the prophet, and improving living conditions would not represent a problem with regard to high dowry.
He also maintains that activation of the law of dowry by the government is one of the main factors here in addition to the role of the citizen. The roles are common concerning the spread of awareness, and providing services such as appropriate housing.
The national committee for women is supposed to discuss such matters and propose suitable solutions for them through holding meetings, effecting programs and drawing up future plans such as awareness symposiums especially by allocating regular programs to be broadcast on mass media especially television and radio.


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