Although all of these issues are interlinked, the Saudi judicial system considers each of them individually. As a result the process of getting a divorce for women can be long and strenuous, especially when ex-husbands create hurdles along the way.

The issue of whether courts should consider these three issues together in a single lawsuit has been a recent hot topic with divorced women, legal professionals and social scientists all having strong opinions on the matter, Al-Riyadh newspaper reported.

Amal Abdullah is a typical Saudi divorcee. She went through a traumatic experience after visiting a court to get a divorce. She has been a frequent visitor to the Kingdom’s courts, first when she sought a divorce, then for custody of her children and finally for maintenance costs to raise them. Accompanied by her elderly father, Amal Abdullah first came to court seeking a khula (a type of divorce that is initiated by a woman). After eight months of deliberations, the court awarded her a divorce. Then began the battle to gain custody of her two children. Her husband, however, fought back and resisted letting go of them. After 12 months of court proceedings and numerous court appearances, Amal Abdullah was given custody of the children. Then she began proceedings to get child-rearing costs from her husband. This again took several months to settle. The divorce and subsequent court proceedings have troubled Amal Abdullah; she is in debt and bankrupt and left with a lot of mental anguish. She is strongly in favor of the three issues being combined in a single lawsuit.

Lawyer Bandar Al-Mohraj feels the same. “It is time to look into this matter properly. Combining these three issues and treating them together in a single lawsuit will allow most divorce cases to be settled quickly,” he said.

He added that the current way these issues are dealt with has made the lives of women very difficult. “Necessary amendments need to be made to personal laws to treat all these three issues in a single lawsuit,” he said. He further cited the difficulties women face when they appear in court unaccompanied by lawyers or without even legal advice. “When judges ask women why they want to divorce, many women cite reasons that simply cannot stand in a court of law. In such cases it becomes difficult for judges to annul marriages,” he said, adding that ignorance of the law results in further delays.

Turki Al-Mahya is a lawyer who believes the three issues should be combined, as this would be in the interest of divorced women and their children. “All three of these issues should be discussed together. When a woman approaches a court for a divorce from her husband who is addicted to drugs, then she has the right to get the divorce if the allegation is true,” he said.

“I believe the other issues of child custody and maintenance costs should be discussed together with the divorce. There should be one judge who looks at all of these matters,” said Al-Mahya.

He added that steps need to be taken to help divorced women, especially since ex-husbands have a tendency to punish their former partners by prolonging court proceedings by persistently failing to attend hearings.

Dr. Omar Al-Khoudi, professor of law at King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, is also in favor of combining the three cases. “All parties in the three separate cases are the same. Men have a tendency not to appear in court, something that results in further delays. Those who lose out at the end are women and their children,” he added.

Meanwhile, Sheikh Hamad Al-Rozain, a judge in Jeddah, said combining the three cases would delay the main case — the divorce. “Combining them into a single lawsuit would be detrimental to women in all senses of the word. This would cause a delay in issuing a verdict on the main case, which is the divorce. This would make matters worse and exacerbate the suffering of divorcees,” he said.

He added that combining the three issues into one would make it easy for judges but not for the women involved. “We’ve seen women who’ve asked courts to deal with the three matters together but they’ve then later changed their minds because this results in the verdict on the divorce being delayed because of lengthy court proceedings,” he said.