State-Salaried, Female Legal Professionals and Foreign Policy in Post-Qadhafi Libya
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CHAPTER �0 The Best of Times, the Worst of Times: State-Salaried, Female Legal Professionals and Foreign Policy in Post-Qadhafi Libya Jessica Carlisle 1 Introduction The corridor outside of judge Maha’s family court, in the central Tripoli court- house, is packed with lawyers and litigants on a Monday morning in May 2013. The lawyers chat amiably between themselves and briefly enter the office in which the hearings will be held to check for information about their cases in the court register. By the time the judge arrives, between nine and nine-thirty, her room is buzzing with men and women who are ushered out by her court clerk, Wafa, and the doorman, Selim. Several lawyers greet her as she enters: including Amal, who is employed in the family law section of the Directorate of Public Lawyers, a legal aid service staffed by lawyers directly employed and salaried by the Ministry of Justice. Amal has been working in the family law for a few years and so is well known in Maha’s court. The two women exchange pleasantries as Maha settles down to begin her morning session. Maha’s court is housed in a small office on the second floor of a slightly dilapidated, functional block that is situated behind the older courthouse building. On the floors below, there are chambers that are more recognizably courts, with a bench for the judge, a stand for witnesses, seating for spectators, and sometimes a cage to confine the accused. Maha makes do with this room, in which the white walls could do with redecoration and the records of the court’s work are handwritten by the court’s clerk, Wafa. The files of the day’s cases are already stacked up on Maha’s desk when I arrive. There are three large filing cabinets along one wall, which I assume contain the current case files, and at the end of the room is a window overlooking an apparently aban- doned schoolyard. There are a couple of chairs left free for visitors. I sit, con- spicuously, behind a third desk under the window. Maha is in court for morning sessions twice a week, and deals with 18 and 24 case files on the two Mondays that I attend. Her work environment is poorly resourced. None of the court’s work is computerized, and I have been told that judges and lawyers lack access to systematic, archived rulings. Nevertheless, © Jessica Carlisle, ���7 | doi ��.��63/978900434��00_0�� This is an open access chapter distributed under the terms of the CC BY-NC 4.0 license. Jessica Carlisle - 9789004342200 Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 08:23:28AM via free access �60 Carlisle Maha is respected by the lawyers I meet in the corridor outside of her court- room for her patient attention to cases. I can also see that she spends a con- siderable amount of time listening to litigants’ stories, exploring their feelings about the situation that has brought them to court, applying the relevant law in response to litigants’ social circumstances and encouraging families to reach mediated agreements. In addition to Maha and Wafa, the majority—if not quite the overwhelming majority—of lawyers and litigants in the court are women. Many litigants have brought lawyers with them, although it is not compulsory to have legal repre- sentation in family cases, and occasionally lawyers energetically plead their clients’ cases standing in the small space between the filing cabinets and the judge’s desk. Maha evidently knows many of them quite well: both members of the public legal aid service and lawyers in private practice. It takes me a while to realize that only private lawyers wear black robes. Before the revolution, the public lawyers also used to wear robes, but these were decorated with bright green sashes associated with the Qadhafi regime. They have been recalled to be redesigned and, in the meantime, public lawyers work in their own clothes. Some of the female public lawyers are very fashion- ably dressed, while others wear more modest manteau coats. All of the male lawyers seem to be in suits. Some of this morning’s business is simply the submission of documents or information by lawyers. A few litigants or their lawyers fail to turn up for their hearings. However, several of the cases involve interactions between the judge and litigants. The applicable substantive legislation is Libya’s Law No. 10/1984 (concerning the Regulation of Marriage and Divorce and Their Effects). Wives, husbands, fiancés and fiancées, parents, and other relatives come in with legal requests for the registration of divorce, post-divorce maintenance and hous- ing, permission to marry before the legal age of marital consent, and legaliza- tion of child custody arrangements. Sometimes litigants stumble over what they want to say or are confused about the law. Maha suggests postponing their hearings and directs them to the public lawyers for legal advice and representation. On one occasion, she spots Amal standing outside and calls her into the court to talk to a woman who wants to make a claim for unpaid child maintenance from her ex-husband. The morning ticks by with the judge, sometimes aided by lawyers, noting submis- sions, taking testimony, notifying litigants to expect a ruling shortly, overseeing agreements negotiated between the spouses themselves, and sometimes try- ing to mediate outside of the law.1 In the course of the session, she questions 1 In one complicated case Maha and Wafa urged an elderly man to reconsider the veracity of his testimony about previously repudiating and then reconciling with his wife, since the Jessica Carlisle - 9789004342200 Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 08:23:28AM via free access The Best of times, the Worst of Times �6� parents at length about why they are requesting the court’s permission for their daughters to marry before the legal age of consent, checks that a young divorcee is really willing to accept a very low amount of child maintenance, and ensures that a child custody arrangement is properly legalized. She is also determined to try to reconcile one young, estranged couple, whose case comes up towards the end of the second court session I observe. The husband and the wife’s brother have come in to court to finalize a talaq (repudiation) divorce. The wife is not with them since her brother has agreed to act as her proxy in finalizing the divorce and accepting the mandated finan- cial settlement (her unpaid dower) on her behalf. The marriage seems suffi- ciently doomed for the husband to have bought in a plastic bag containing a huge block of ten dinar notes wrapped in cellophane. However, Maha has noticed that he has also included a small box of chocolates in the bag as a gift. He explains that the breakup isn’t his wife’s fault, accusing their extended family of being at the root of their problems. In addition, the wife’s brother confirms that the marriage has been a good one. Wafa, the court clerk, tells the husband that the judge has “a feeling” about his case. Maha asks the wife’s brother to phone the wife to ask her to come into the court. When the wife later arrives at the end of the morning’s session, Maha speaks both to her and her husband separately in an attempt to bring about a reconcil- iation. It seems that it is too upsetting for them to come into the office together. Each of them blames their problems on the other spouse’s relatives. The wife says that the husband’s mother and sister are hostile to her, while the husband says that the wife’s sister constantly interferes. Accusations fly. No matter how many times the judge reminds them that they have children and the right to a private married life free from interference from their extended family, they both reply that the situation is hopeless. After around half an hour, the judge relents. The wife’s brother signs to say that he has witnessed the divorce, while the wife stays outside of the courtroom. After the husband has gone, leaving the money and the chocolates behind him, Maha asks her to come in for a final talk. The wife becomes tearful, in response to which both Maha and Wafa stress that she and her ex-husband could try to save the marriage within the upcoming waiting period (‘idda).2 implication of the dates he gave was that he had not been legally married to his wife for the past three years. Maha sent him away to think about the timing of events and to consider remaining in his marriage. He returned to the court the following week still determined to go through with the divorce, which Maha then allowed. 2 This period lasts for three months during which the couple may reconcile and revoke the divorce. Jessica Carlisle - 9789004342200 Downloaded from Brill.com09/26/2021 08:23:28AM via free access �6� Carlisle Other judges and lawyers in Syria and Morocco have previously told me that family cases are the most taxing to deal with, given their emotional complexity. After a couple of hearings in which warring spouses have battled their disputes out in front of her, Maha confirms that she shares this sentiment when she turns to me and remarks, “Judges have a tough life!” Moreover, it is apparent, even after only two days in Maha’s court, that these are unusual times. The aftermath of the 2011 revolution has impinged on the ebb and flow of the family court’s business when I look up from writing my field notes and notice that the judge is taking an unusual witness statement.