Activity of the Committee for Equality in Inheritance Rights

On the morning of Friday, March 8 last, the Committee for Equality in Inheritance Rights called a press conference, held at the headquarters of the Lebanese Kataeb.

Mrs. Laure Nasr Moghaizel welcomed the journalists, then introduced the committee's president, Mrs. Laure Tabet, president of the League of Women's Organizations in Lebanon, who in her turn introduced the members of the committee, presenting each briefly. They are:

Dr. Jamal Karam Harfush, Dr. Salwa Nassar, and Mesdames Heneni Tarcha, Anissa Najjar, Emily Fares Ibrahim, and Laure Moghaizel...

Mrs. Moghaizel then rose to review woman's struggle for equality in inheritance, and to set out the efforts that have been made toward that end...

She said that this bill was first submitted in 1949, but that the women's committee was not formed until 1954; its first task was to spread publicity for the justice of the aim it works for, and to make contact with the responsible circles, which expressed their support and encouragement for the bill. As a result of these efforts, the bill was referred to the Chamber of Deputies for debate and vote...

Mrs. Moghaizel then turned to the bill's most important articles and features, summarizing them as follows:

1 — The bill respects all the religious laws existing in Lebanon, and therefore applies only to Lebanese women who are not Muslims or Druze.

2 — It grants general equality between males and females, and enables the testator to bestow half his fortune on whomever he wishes.

3 — The bill consecrates the principle of representation, under which grandchildren are entitled to receive the share of their deceased father.

4 — It recognizes a share of the inheritance for the illegitimate child.

5 — It safeguards, in particular, the provisions governing the inheritance of a missing person.

6 — Alongside the official will, it establishes a new form of will, written in the testator's own hand.

7 — And this law has created an occasion for the settlement of estates.

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In closing, Mrs. Moghaizel expressed the committee's determination to press on with its efforts to win the second lap of the course, and appealed to the journalists to support the committee in its just cause until it reaches its final goal...

Before the meeting ended, the floor was opened to questions; the journalists asked whatever they pleased, and voiced their support for the "Committee for Equality in Inheritance Rights" in what it is striving for.

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