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00:00 - Introduction
00:24 - Legal Structure
01:04 - Case Excerpt
03:09 - Prerequisites to Marriage Validity
03:32 - Marriage as per Shariah Principles
04:26 - Pillars of Marriage
04:50 - Conclusion
05:18 - New Legal Updates
06:18 - Coverage of New Law
06:24 - Marriage for Non-Muslims
06:58 - Appropriate Age of Marriage
The Legal Structure
Marriage is a contract that legalizes the enjoyment between the husband and wife; its objective is to protect and form a steady family under the care of the husband and ensure the spouse the assumptions of affection and compassion as mentioned in Article 19 of the Law. Nevertheless, as mentioned before, the Family Law lays down certain prerequisites to prove the occurrence of any marriage solemnized within or outside the country. This is under Article 27 of the Law which primarily states that Marriage shall be officially recorded, but in consideration of a specific fact, it can be proved by other means admitted by the Law of Sharia.
Case Excerpt
The aforementioned statement was well explained by Dubai Personal Status Court under case number 1032/2017 wherein the plaintiff (husband) registered a divorce case against the defendant (wife) by submitting the Marriage Certificate attested by a notary public of New York as the marriage was consummated in the USA. Plaintiff confirmed that the marriage was made following American law and considering the defendant is a Christian, her guardian did not attend the marriage ceremony (as not required in American Law) and the dowry was never discussed. The plaintiff asserted that the defendant is not obedient and initiates fights on the grounds of different religions and thus requested the annulment of marriage.
The parties since failed to amicably resolve the dispute before Family Guidance Committee, the matter was registered before the Personal Status Court, wherein the Defendant submitted her defence stating that the Courts of UAE are incompetent to issue a judgment on the concerned case.
Upon receiving the memorandums submitted by both parties, the court issued a verdict based on several provisions which will be discussed in this video. Primarily, the court established that both the parties are not citizens of the USA, thus, none of them requested to apply for the country of their origin and thus, following Article 2(1) of the Family Law, the case will be governed following the Family Law of UAE.
Secondly, about the defence submitted by the defendant (challenging the competency of UAE courts to issue a verdict on the said case) the court ruled that the statement of the defendant is invalid as per Article 5 of the Family Law which reads as follows:
The courts of the state are competent to look into the cases of personal status filed against citizens and expatriates who have the country of origin or address or place of work inside the country." Having said that, since at the time of registration of the case, both the parties were residents of UAE, thus, courts have full jurisdiction to try the matter. Furthermore, the court while confirming the validity of the marriage certificate relied on several provisions of the Family Law such as Article 4, 27(1) and 3 and Article 12(2) of the Civil Procedures Law. Additionally, the court confirmed that the prerequisites to determine the validity of the marriage referred mainly to the law of each party at the time of marriage and that means of documenting the marriage as one of the formal conditions of marriage, which falls in the scope of application of the country where the marriage has been concluded and that documenting the marriage is originally by an official document issued by the judge or priest appointed by the minister of justice.
In furtherance, it is valid and important to document the marriage as per Sharia principles in terms of witnessed by two men or one man and two women, where it is not feasible to document it by decisive oath or even by turning it away and to evaluate the existence of a certain fact in case of non-documentation of marriage is one of the topics exclusively determined by the court whenever its judgment was based on solid grounds with strong reasoning of documents, it is also established that validity of the marriage cannot be determined except after proving it under Sharia Law (referring to Personal Status Court of Appeal case number 65/2007).
Originally published 12 June 2024
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.
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