“The government is now on the right path,” said Shaiban.

By Waleed Tulmasani, IOL Correspondent

ALGIERS, February 23, 2005 (IslamOnline.net) – Algerian Islamic circles welcomed Wednesday, February 23, a government decision to backtrack on scrapping the role of a wali (a woman’s guardian) in concluding marriage contracts under the new amendments to the 1984 family code.

“If I say backtrack, that’s the wrong word, because the government is now on the right path, following in the footsteps of the righteous ancestors,” Sheikh Abdul Rahman Shaiban, chief of Algeria ’s Muslim Scholars Association, told IslamOnline.net.

“The question is why did the government step out of the road in the first place? It is really shocking to circumvent the rules and tenets enshrined in the Noble Qur’an and the Sunnah.”

According to Shari`ah (Islamic Law), in order to conclude her marriage, a Muslim woman should have a guardian, given that women are subject to the desires of the ill-hearted and evil opportunists.

A guardian should be a relative Muslim male and is usually the father. Next to the father comes the closest male relative.

The order, according to many is: father, paternal grandfather, son, grandson, full brother, paternal half-brother, and paternal uncle.

Football Match

Harakat Moudjtamaa As-Silm (HMS), the second largest Islamic party and a strong opponent to the amended code, also hailed the government move.

“It was all like a football match: the government was caught in an offside and the referee [President Abdel Aziz Bouteflika] blew his whistle,” HMS deputy chief Abdelmajid Manasra told IOL.

“It proves that the president is not swimming against the mainstream current. The Algerian family should not be controlled by un-Islamic laws. As an Islamic party, we will put forward amendments to the family code that really protects women’s rights,” Manasra, a former industry minister, added.

HMS is represented in the government by four ministers, who gave the thumbs-down to the secularism-based amendments.

Abdul Khafour Saadi, deputy chairman of the leading El-Islah Al-Watani (National Reform) party, said the struggle of the Islamic parties has paid off.

The movement had launched a campaign to collect the signatures of one million women opposing the new amendments.

The proposed amendments mainly called for ending the role of a wali in concluding marriage contracts and setting a prior judicial consent as a condition for polygamy.

The Islamic parties have rejected the amendments, arguing that the constitution stipulated that Islam was the official religion of the state.

Followers of the Ibadiya, a moderate Shiite mahdhab of Kharijite sect, also slammed the amendments, saying the Ibadi principles deem a marriage without a wali an “adultery”.