Yasmine Esquivel Mossa: "Morocco's Constitution advocates gender parity"

Group visit to the Hassan II Mosque with Yasmine Esquivel Mossa

Khadija Taouil

30 de abril de 2024 (06:10 h.)

The Moroccan Constitution is avant-garde modern and advanced

Yasmine Esquivel Mossa praised the Moroccan Constitution as a modern, avant-garde and advanced constitution that opens the way for women and, thanks to which, Morocco has become a model country for other countries in the area of achieving equality between men and women.

The minister pointed out that Morocco, through its Constitution and the interest of King Mohammed VI, is working on the improvement of women's rights, their development and their protection as well.

The Minister said that the goal of achieving equality and parity is something common between Mexico and Morocco, as well as the rest of the countries of the world, stressing the importance of seeking how to integrate women in decision-making and overcome all discrimination in order to achieve equality, security and peace.

She also insisted on the relevance of common cooperation and exchange of experiences between the two countries in order to consolidate the position of women judges.

The Moroccan Constitution not only provides for equal rights and freedoms for women and men, it also prescribes, in article 19, that the State acts to achieve parity between men and women, as well as the creation of an authority for parity and the fight against all forms of discrimination.

The status of women in the judiciary in Morocco has been strengthened and placed at the centre of reform programmes so that they can fully enjoy their professional rights, in accordance with the directives of King Mohammed VI.

"The Moroccan monarch's support for women's issues and his ongoing commitment to gender equality in the justice sector, as in all other areas of public life, and his concern to promote their rights, concretely reflect the will of a country, King and people to end all forms of discrimination against women and the progressive inclusion of women in decision-making spaces," Esquivel explained.

Tribute to Minister Yasmine Esquivel Mossa by the Moroccan Association of Women Judges in the presence of the Moroccan Ambassador to Mexico, Abdelfattah Labbar

The principle of gender parity in the Mexican Constitution

In 2024, Mexico commemorates the 50th anniversary of the Mexican Constitution's recognition of the principle of legal equality between men and women.

In the 1990s, the so-called electoral and political representation quotas were introduced, an affirmative action that was immediately reflected in the nomination of candidates by political parties for elected office and, consequently, in the integration of a greater number of women in the congress or federal entity.

These mandatory gender quotas imposed the nomination of women in a proportion that improved from 2002 to 2008. Further progress was made in February 2014 with the so-called political-electoral reform, which introduced substantial changes by raising the rule of gender parity in the nomination of candidates for federal and local legislators to constitutional rank.

It was also applied in the election of deputies and senators to the General Congress and of deputies to the congresses of the federal entities, of an obligatory nature and with safeguards to avoid possible violations.

By 2023, women in the Chamber of Deputies represented 50%, and 50.4 % in the Senate.

Yasmine Esquivel Mossa received by the president of the Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Services of Casablanca

Women's participation in the judiciary in some countries around the world

The International Court of Human Rights has three women out of seven members (42%).
The African Court of Human Rights has 3 women out of 11 members (27%).
The European Court of Human Rights has 16 women out of 47 members (34%).
The International Court of Justice has 3 women out of 15 members (20%).
The International Criminal Court has 11 women out of 18 members (61%).
The International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea has 6 women out of 21 members (28%).
In Brazil, the Federal Supreme Court has one woman out of 11 ministers (9%).
In Argentina (0% women), the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation has five members, none of whom are women.
In the United States, the Supreme Court has four women out of nine members (44%).
In Uruguay, the Supreme Court has three women out of five members (60%).
In Colombia, the Supreme Court has 11 women out of 23 justices (47%).
In Chile, the Supreme Court of Justice has eight women out of 21 members (38%).
In El Salvador, the Supreme Court has 14 members, four of whom are women (28%).
In Spain, the Supreme Court has one woman out of 11 members (9%).
In the United Kingdom, the Supreme Court has two women out of 12 members (16%).
In Iceland, the Icelandic Supreme Court has three women out of seven members (42%).
In the Czech Republic, the Supreme Court has four women out of 15 members (26%).
In Japan, the Japanese Supreme Court has 15 members, no women (0%).
In China, the Supreme People's Court of the People's Republic of China has three women out of 11 members (27%).
In Turkey, the Court of Cassation has 28 members, no women (0%).
In Australia, the Australian Supreme Court has seven members, three are women (42%).
In Nigeria, the Nigerian Supreme Court has 13 members, four are women (30%).
In Rwanda, the Rwandan Supreme Court has seven members, four are women (57%).
In South Africa, the Supreme Court of Appeal has 23 members, 13 women (56%).

Gender Parity in the Mexican Federal Judiciary

As a result of the constitutional reform on gender parity in June 2019, Article 94 of the Constitution was added to state that the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation will be composed of eleven members, both ministers and ministros.

The integration of the jurisdictional bodies must be by means of open competitions, observing the principle of gender parity. The great debt that still exists in terms of parity is revealed by the fact that in the integration of jurisdictional bodies, women have a scarce presence as heads of jurisdictional bodies.

In June 2019, the Plenary of the Federal Judiciary Council approved the General Agreement that establishes the procedure and general guidelines for accessing the position of District Judges, through internal competitive examinations.

Tribute to Minister Yasmine Esquivel Mossa by the Moroccan Association of Women Judges in the presence of the Moroccan Ambassador to Mexico, Abdelfattah Labbar

Exclusive competitions to give more representation to women

In June 2020, the call for the first open competition for the appointment of District Judges specialised in labour matters was published; based on the related agreement, it was foreseen that the second stage of the competition should be made up of the same number of men and women, specifying that in case the total number of vacancies was an odd number, it would correspond to a woman, among other affirmative actions foreseen.

The Judicial Career Law (2021) includes to a large extent these policies that represented real affirmative actions, implemented in order to comply with international and national regulations on equality.