ADEW empowers women in Morocco

CAIRO – 10 October 2017: The European Institute of the Mediterranean (IEMed) chose The Association for Development and Enhancement of Women (ADEW) to fund the Capacity Building in the Southern Mediterranean to Open Policy Dialogue and Monitoring for Women in Society (CSO WINS) project.

Co-funded by IEMed and the European Union, the project plans to establish and support organizations that advocate gender equality and women’s rights in southern Mediterranean countries.

ADEW was given the opportunity to transplant their 30 years of practice in the field of gender equality to Anaout Association for Woman and Child in Chichaoua, Morocco as part of the CSO WINS project.

“Through the partnership with the Moroccan association, ADEW is achieving one of its main goals which is transferring its knowledge and expertise to other organizations working in the field of women’s empowerment,” ADEW’s chairwoman Iman Bibars stated.

Striving to transform the way culture and society see and treat women, ADEW is an organization that aims to establish rights for women in Egypt. ADEW offers different programs that cater to empowering women in legal, economic and cultural sectors.

The aim of CSO WINS is to amend the legal age of marriage in the province of Chichaoua; a city where young girls and minors unwillingly leave their education to get married.

While it is illegal for minors to be married before the age of 18, article 20 in the Moroccan Family Code allows minors to be married if legal guardians present a valid reason.

The collaboration between the two associations aims to create a long term campaign to inform the marriage commissioners of the violations that they are committing, and to change the legal marriage age to 18.

The mentorship offered by ADEW will allow other associations to supervise their progress and analyze women’s development, implementing campaigns that will ultimately achieve their goal.