ACCORDING to figures released by the General Authority for Statistics (GaStat) recently, there were 58,000 divorces in the Kingdom last year representing about 24 percent of the total number of the marriage contracts, which was put at 158,000 during the year. The Justice Ministry, on the other hand, said courts issued 4,688 divorce deeds all over the Kingdom this February alone, which is a rise of about 14 percent over the number of divorces in the previous month, which was 4,004. The ministry said every month there were between 179 and 253 divorce cases documented in various parts of the Kingdom. This simply means that there were seven divorces taking place in the Kingdom every hour. Divorce, as a family consultant puts it, is a divinely sanctioned system to permanently settle the differences between married couples after all other possible means of finding an amicable solution get exhausted. Divorce, whatever its causes may be, will result in a number of problems including family disintegration. The children are the main victims of divorce. They grow up amidst an emotional and social void, which subject them to suffer failure in later lives. The children might also be kidnapped intellectually and morally by evil people. The divorcees will be subject to immense psychological and economic pressures. They might not find another chance to get married with the growing number of spinsters in the country. Men who fail in their first marriage may be hesitant to marry again especially after the huge expenses they had incurred in their first marriage. The causes of divorce are numerous and varied. They mostly stem from the intellectual, cultural and psychological differences between the couples. The lack of awareness on the importance of preserving the family life is another cause of divorce, which might happen due to a reaction in a fit of anger either by the husband or the wife. I call for conducting an in-depth and transparent study to determine the causes of divorce with a view to mitigating them. The study should come out with clear-cut recommendations, which should be implemented and not kept to rot in the drawers.
