Mothers in Jordan are entitled to full rights

According to a recent study compiled by the Department of Statistics (DoS) on "fertility, mortality, family planning, maternal and child health and nutrition" in Jordan, 49 per cent of Jordanian mothers do not want "another" child. 

This comes as no surprise given the fact that modern Jordanian women want a life outside the four walls of their homes. 

Modern Jordanian mothers are better educated, more enlightened, more ambitious and seek, above all, to be productive to their society and country as equal to men. Gone are the days when Jordanian wives are satisfied with being just housewives, giving birth to children and rearing them day and night, and meanwhile denied their natural role in their country as major contributors to the national economy and the progress of their people. 

There was a time when traditional families confined the role of wives to their homes. Now that the liberation of women is in full swing and their emancipation from worn out traditions and traditional confines is unstoppable, women can no longer remain enslaved to the confines of their traditional role. Modern women seek their recognition as persons on par with men and will stop at nothing till they achieve their full rights as equal human beings. Higher education and higher cost of living are opening new opportunities to modern wives to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with their husbands. That is the way wives become equal to men with equal rights, spousal or otherwise. 

The only surprise in the DoS study is the finding that only 49 per  cent of wives do not want more children. One would have thought that the greater majority of wives are now seeking more recognition as important contributors to their country's progress and development. Obviously they cannot do that if society imposes on them only a role for child bearing and rearing. Women in Jordan now are enjoying full political and economic rights and they are now out to claim them. 

To be sure women are still denied their full civil rights, on top of which is the right to pass on their citizenship to their children. Yet, this transgression on the civil rights of women cannot be expected to stay for too long. Jordan is under constant and persistent international pressure especially by international human rights bodies to lift this grave violation. Sooner or later, Jordan will have to abide by international norms and complete the circle of rights accorded to women.