The Milli Majlis Committee for Family, Women’s and Children’s Affairs organised a hearing ‘The Enforcement Status of the Law “On the Maintenance of the Gender Equality (of Men and Women)”: Opportunities and Complications’ with the involvement of MPs, government officials and civil activists on 4 March.

Chair of the above-said Committee Hijran Huseynova opened the hearing. She emphasised that the Azerbaijani State always reacted adequately to all developments and passed resolutions and laws with full consideration given to the modern realia in all the areas without exceptions and keeping firmly in sight new challenges as they arose. As an example, Mrs Huseynova mentioned the Law ‘On the Maintenance of the Gender Equality (between Men and Women)’ enacted as far back as in 2006 – 15 years ago, that is. Eliminating all sorts of gender discrimination, that law provides men and women with equal opportunities in the political, economic, social, cultural and other fields and was also the key step taken to ensure gender equality in our country. At that, Azerbaijan passed its gender equality law before a number of UN and European states. The enactment was followed by a new expert review of the whole national legislative frameworks with many laws and codes being subsequently amended and added to in line with the then new law.

And yet, Mrs Huseynova continued, the passage of time puts forth new demands; new challenges arise, too, necessitating revision of both the current laws and of their enforcement practice complete with finding lacunas in the latter. The report on the Law ‘On the Maintenance of the Gender Equality (between Men and Women)’, first heard in the Milli Majlis in December 2020, highlighted the need to streamline the application toolset whilst also passing several addenda and amendments to the law itself.

Mrs Huseynova concluded her speech by telling the participants her suggestions regarding the law.

That was followed by a spacious report by Chair of the State Committee for Family, Women’s and Children’s Problems Bahar Muradova who made known her considerations and pinpointed the existing opportunities and difficulties with the enforcement of the law in question. The demand of the day, and a pressing one, too, is that the law should be updated because the State has assumed certain international obligations in the fifteen years past; on top of that, new issues have come to the fore due to the progress of Azerbaijan as well as being dictated by the modern life. All those require serious consideration, according to Mrs Muradova. We ought to live up to new demands and face new challenges – those that time and life put before us. The pandemic and war periods showed us clearly what our complications with gender equality are made of, too, she added.

Gender matters should be treated with sensitivity in the work of all the bodies responsible for application of laws, in all the reports they draw up and the whole analytical work they carry out. Besides, this is in the sight of the Sustainable Development Goals, too, Mrs Muradova remarked.

The following reports were heard next: the ‘Maintenance of the Gender Equality in Education’ by Deputy Minister of Education Firudin Gurbanov, the ‘Maintenance of the Gender Equality on the Law-Enforcement Plane’ by Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs Ismat Aliyev and the ‘Future Guarantees of Gender Equality in Labour Legislation’ by Deputy Minister of Labour and Social Protection of the Population Anar Karimov. Those reports also contained a string of suggestions concerning the law at issue.

The extensive discussion that followed was marked by the opinions and proposals offered by Deputy Chair of the parliamentary Committee for Family, Women’s and Children’s Affairs Jala Aliyeva, the same Committee’s members Sevil Mikayilova, Tamam Jafarova and Konul Nurullayeva, Chair of the Public Association for Aiding Women ‘The Clean World’ Mehriban Zeynalova and Head of the Information and Analytical Research Department of the State Committee for Family, Women’s and Children’s Problems Elgun Safarov.

Hijran Huseynova summarised the discussion.

The others who attended the hearing were also the MPs of the Milli Majlis Rauf Aliyev, Parvin Karimzade, Ramin Mammadov and Sadagat Valiyeva, department heads from the State Committee for Family, Women’s and Children’s Problems Taliya Ibrahimova and Kamala Ojagova, Gender Matters Co-ordinator of the Public Association ‘The Organisation Against Human Trade’ Leyli Bayramova, Chair of the Public Association for Sound Life Sadagat Huseynova, Chair of the (Sumgait Branch) Women’s Initiative and Women’s Social Troubleshooting Public Association Zemfira Mustafayeva and Chair of the Handicapped Women’s Society Mahluga Rahimova.

The Press and Public Relations
Department The Milli Majlis