CAIRO — The Egyptian Justice Ministry, in cooperation with Dar al-Iftaa, held a training program last month for authorized marriage registrars, known as mazouns, including instructions on how to investigate verbal divorce petitions before their official authentication.

Under religious laws, a Muslim man in Egypt can divorce his wife by merely stating, "I hereby divorce you." The divorce is then officially notarized. If the oral declaration of divorce takes place in front of the authorized person and is immediately notarized, the divorce cannot be rescinded.

The training course, held Oct. 28, focused on oral divorce because it is the most common type of divorce in Egypt, and it often does not end up being registered because of the context in which the word "divorce" between the spouses was mentioned. For such a divorce to be valid, according to Al Azhar's Council of Senior Scholars, the husband must make the proclamation of divorce "through a legal capacity and a conscious will." Officials were trained to clarify the surrounding circumstances and whether the divorce was then documented or not, according to legal provisions.

The program involved 903 registrars from across the country’s governorates and was aimed at raising awareness of the consequences of divorce. The training program aims to broaden the role for marriage registrars — looking into the intention and sincerity of verbal divorce statements — and not limit their jobs to the legal process and documentation of these divorces.