Personal-status law of non-Muslims to be unified

CAIRO – 14 April 2019: Spokesperson of the Catholic Church Hany Bakhoum revealed details of the Christian denominations' meeting to reach a unified draft for the personal-status law of non-Muslims.

Bakhoum stated that Pope Tawadros II,pope of Alexandria and patriarch of the Coptic Orthodox Church; André Zaki, the vice president of the Evangelical Community in Egypt; Patriarch Ibrahim Isaac; and Bishop Ibrahim Hanna agreed on all arguable articles that Christians call to change it.

Moreover, the church spokesperson affirmed that the personal-status law will be drafted by churches' legal advisors and handed to specialized authorities to be publicly stated.

Some 90 percent of the Evangelical Christian Church members rejected the personal status law proposed by the Evangelical denominations’ legal committee in mid-June 2016 that called for civil marriage and not to limiting reasons of divorce to adultery and religious conversion,preferring to follow the old law set in 1902.

The rejected law allowed multiple reasons for divorce, mainly adultery, religious conversion, long separation, abandonment and imprisonment of one of the partners.
Pope Tawadros II mentioned that the Holy Synod of the Coptic Orthodox Church allows divorce in cases of adultery and religious conversion.

Following discussions, it was decided that a civil judge will allow divorce for partners separated for more than 3 years and have no children and for those separated for 5 years and have children.