Male Guardianship Laws in Yemen Continue to Violate Women’s Rights and Freedom
This article is published in collaboration with Egab, a platform empowering journalists from the Middle East and Africa to publish stories in international media outlets.
On May 15, 2023, Amani Saleh, a 28-year-old journalist and aid worker from the coastal city of Al Hudaydah in western Yemen, embarked on what should have been a promising journey. She was headed to Amsterdam to participate in an international training program on transitional justice, peace, and human rights.
But on the way to the airport in Sana’a, her bus was stopped at a checkpoint run by Houthi rebels, who control much of northern Yemen. The fighters pulled her off the bus, insisting she couldn’t travel without a male guardian, or mahram. They seized her belongings and refused to let her continue—unless she paid a bribe. Only after handing over the money was she allowed to proceed.
Saleh’s experience highlights a widespread challenge experienced by Yemeni women. The Houthis’ takeover in 2014 and the ensuing civil war worsened living conditions for women in a country that was already ranked the lowest-ranked country worldwide for gender equality over the last decade.
Once Saleh reached the airport, the challenges persisted. Upon arrival, she was required to obtain a travel permit from the Ministry of Transport, where officials insisted that one of her male relatives sign a waiver allowing her permission to travel without a male guardian. After several failed attempts to convince them otherwise, an airport employee offered to help her — for a bribe of 30,000 Yemeni riyals ($60 USD).
“Even after the ordeal was over, the employee began sending me offensive messages and calls on WhatsApp,” Saleh told More to Her Story, adding that she had to change her phone number to stop his harassment.
The Yemeni government claims the mahram system, which has roots in cultural and religious Islamic traditions, is designed to protect women. But in practice, women and advocates warn the laws often make way for blackmail, harassment, and further violations of women’s rights and dignity.
“Rather than focusing on securing clean water, food, and sufficient aid for people in Yemen to alleviate the humanitarian crisis caused by the war, the warring [political] parties are spending their energy on placing obstacles to women’s freedom of movement,” Niku Jafarnia, Yemen and Bahrain researcher at Human Rights Watch (HRW), told More to Her Story. “These restrictions to movement badly impact women’s lives, limiting their ability to access healthcare, education, work, or even visit their families.”
In a March report, HRW reported that Yemen’s warring parties are “systematically violating women’s right to freedom of movement” by barring them from traveling between governorates and abroad amidst a compounding humanitarian crisis that is among the worst in the world.
‘My child is my guardian’
In early August 2024, 48-year-old Hayat Muqbil was detained by Houthi recruits at a military checkpoint on the southern outskirts of Sana’a for attempting to travel without a mahram. She was on her way to Aden to visit her ailing mother. With her husband working abroad and a son who happened to be sitting an exam on the day she traveled, Hayat was forced to turn back to Sana’a after enduring insults and verbal abuse by Houthi officers at checkpoints along the way.
“In the end, I went with my son to the Houthi Ministry of Transport to get a travel permit. My 13-year-old son served as my guardian. It’s shameful. We’re in the 21st century, and yet this group still views women as having no rights. This is the harsh reality we face,” she told More to Her Story.
Aside from the restrictions imposed by authorities, other public sectors are pressured to comply with Yemen’s restrictive laws.
Hussam Al-Qudsi, a bus driver, said, “We no longer accept bookings from women traveling without a mahram due to the obstacles we face at security checkpoints. The guards at these checkpoints now fine us and demand bribes to allow us to pass. It’s become a routine problem for women, and there's little we can do about it.”
In the country’s south, under the governance of an internationally-backed administration, women enjoy broader freedoms. Similar restraints on traveling for women were undone in 2022 after widespread backlash. However, the rise of Salafi groups allied with the Southern Transitional Council (STC), which advocates for Yemen’s secession, has seen the imposing of similar restrictions on women’s movement, mirroring the restrictions already enforced in the Houthi-controlled north.
Hanin Al-Aghwani, a Yemeni artist, recounted her experience at a checkpoint in Aden, where gunmen affiliated with the STC stopped her as she was on her way to Cairo for an artistic event. She was detained for hours, and the gunmen insisted she find a male relative to escort her. Unable to secure a male family member, the STC ordered the driver to take her back to the city, but she managed to persuade the driver to do otherwise and helped her catch her flight to Cairo.
“I was afraid while I was at Aden airport, which is controlled by extremist forces, and I was afraid that I would be prevented from traveling, and every now and then someone would come to ask me why I was traveling alone, and that I should have a male companion with me,” she said.
Yemeni law was amended in 1990 to grant all citizens, regardless of gender, the right to apply for a passport. In practice, however, women are still required to have the consent and presence of a male guardian to obtain or renew their passports or identity cards. Moreover, if a male guardian reports a woman for traveling without his approval, security forces have the authority to detain her at checkpoints. These mahram restrictions on women’s rights violate international human rights standards of freedom of movement. Despite international humanitarian aid, little focus is on addressing these discriminatory practices’ root causes.
Yemeni women have long faced persecution, but the war has only deepened their struggles, says Mohammed al-Wateeri, a researcher in international human rights law. “Things have gotten much worse,” he said. “And no one is seriously working on real solutions to end this discrimination.”