SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT - UAE Interact

246 U N I T E D A R A B E M I R AT E S Y E A R B O O K 2 0 0 8Under the Constitution,women enjoy the samelegal status, claimto titles, access toeducation, health careand social welfareand the same rightto practice professionsas men.primary education has now reached 83 per cent and females form62 per cent of the total number of students in higher education,with a steady growth in the number of women with Masters andPhD degrees. As a result, 66 per cent of employees in the publicsector, including education, medicine, diplomacy and armed forces,are women, of which 30 per cent are in decision-making positions.The belief that women are entitled to take their place in societyand become effective partners in the development process isgrounded in the UAE Constitution, which guarantees the principlesof social justice for all, in accordance with the precepts of Islam.Under the Constitution, women enjoy the same legal status,claim to titles, access to education, health care and social welfareand the same right to practice professions as men.The guarantees enshrined in the Constitution have been carriedthrough into implementing legislation. Under the terms of theLabour Law, for example, discrimination between men andwomen in terms of equal pay for equal work is proscribed. TheCivil Service Law also allows for extensive maternity leave, andin 2005 civil service rules governing additional payments forchildren and housing were amended to eliminate any gender-baseddiscrimination against employees. New laws have also been issuedto allow divorced or widowed UAE women who were married tonon-citizens to pass on their citizenship to their children.The Government has also acceded to a number of internationalagreements specifically relating to women and children, includingthe Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of DiscriminationAgainst Women (CEDAW) and the UN Convention on the Rights ofthe Child.Over and beyond this legislative framework, the Governmentcontinues to make the necessary efforts to mainstream andpromote gender equality and justice in all government institutions,with special emphasis on schools and the media, and it continuesto work on removing social and psychological barriers that impedethe full integration of women into the labour force, especially in theprivate sector. Although great strides have been made, there is ageneral awareness that the journey has just begun.