When men make laws concerning issues that are primarily associated with women
The Department of Immigration proposes a new rule that requires Nepali women under 40 years traveling abroad to get approval from family and their local ward office.
With the claim that the new amendment would protect women against trafficking and other abuses, the Department of Immigration proposed an amendment to the procedure for Nepali women traveling abroad. The Department proposed that women under 40 years of age require family’s consent to travel overseas. In addition to family consent, women also require approval from their local ward office.
The proposed amendment also requires women traveling abroad to either have a family member accompany them and approval from the ward office or buy non-life insurance of up to NRs. 1.5 million.
The amendment is unconstitutional and also violates the “Article 13” of the United Nations’ (UN) Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
[Article 13] of UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.
(2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.
Moreover, the amendment will not even protect Nepali women as the Department claims it would. Existing research in trafficking in Nepal suggests that traffickers are usually family members or close relatives. The fact is the majority of women who are trafficked are accompanied by traffickers, who again are usually family members or some close relatives. So allowing women accompanied by a family member to travel abroad to solve human trafficking makes no sense. The amendment is based on half-baked research, and at its very best, it is patriarchy at the display.
What about men? Human trafficking is not limited to women. Although there are many women compared to men when it concerns trafficking, existing data shows that even Nepali men have been the victims of trafficking.
This amendment is nothing more than an example of “What goes wrong when a manel sits together to make decisions concerning problems that are primarily associated with women?” It is regressive and is rooted in patriarchy. The next time you ask us why women demand more representation in all sectors of decision making, look back at this decision by a board of three ignorant men (Ramesh Kumar KC, Teknarayan Paudel, and Chudaraj Neupane) and please keep quiet!
New Updates: (Saw this on Feb. 10, 2021 at 23:00 (EST))
In their new press release, the Department of Immigration states that the proposed amendment is limited to women traveling to the Gulf and African countries, alone and for the first time. They add that no decision has been made regarding the proposed amendment.
Again, this looks more like a patch to address the social media backlash than a well-researched solution to the bigger problem: human trafficking. While the government must find a solution to the existing trafficking problems, it should come from research and not be discriminatory against women. And it should be constitutional. The proposed amendment is none and will not mitigate trafficking. Instead, it will encourage people to find illegal channels to migrate and put the already vulnerable more at risk.
The government should prioritize working with the Gulf nations to provide better protection for the migrant workers and prosecute the abusers. Giving migrant workers better training, educating them on their rights, and making the resources they would require accessible is a route the government should opt for. Making discriminatory laws as such is unconstitutional and it does not even ensure the safety of women as it claims to.