RIYADH: The unabated rise in spinsterhood and increasing rate of divorce in the Kingdom has always been a cause of concern. In a fresh call, a teaching faculty at the Qasim University has suggested ways to tackle the problem, insisting that social obligations like demanding high meher (dowry) will have to be overcome.
Abdulaziz Al-Mishaiqih of the university recommended that the government should intervene to determine the meher. “This will hopefully deter some families from playing with the future of girls as well as stop them from costly wedding parties,” reported a local daily.
As if the problem of girls remaining at home, mainly due to meher, was not enough, the divorce rate has also shot up in the Kingdom. According to statistics, some 60,000 marriages took place last year but 18,000 divorce cases (30 percent of marriage cases) were reported at the same time, local media said.
“The number of spinsters has reached 1.5 million and is expected to hit four million in the next five years,” Al-Mishaiqih said.
The major reason for rising rate of spinsterhood is high dowry demand in many parts of the Kingdom, he said. “This has prompted Saudi men to marry foreigners.”
Al-Mishaiqih urged the imams, university professors and media to consistently do something to address the problem of spinsterhood. Last month, a judge said 60 percent of divorce cases in the Kingdom take place in the first year of marriage.
The Justice Ministry had said it would conduct a study aimed at determining the reasons for the spiralling divorce cases in the Kingdom.
A ministry official said they want to gather accurate information on the divorce cases and their impact on society and judiciary. The ministry wants to publish a guidebook to warn couples on potential problems to their marriages, so that the rate of divorce comes down, he said.
