Annual Report of The National Council for Human Rights

Chapter Six - Cont.
Recommendations

1- To facilitate the procedures of reimbursing pensions or assistance to maintain the dignity of entitled citizens.

2- To extend all the five social securities chains (insurance against senility, disability and death- workmen injury insurance- insurance of sickness- unemployment insurance- honoring pensioners) to cover all those insured on the level of all the insurance systems.

3- To constantly reconsider the minimum limit of the pension in order to be equivalent to the minimum wage limit, as well as reconsider the wage for subscribing in the insurance, and therefore the maximum limit for the pension, in light of the changes, with full conservation of the financial equilibrium of the social security funds.

4- To achieve consistency between the legislations caring for the poor, i.e. : social security pension and assistances, El Sadat pension and comprehensive insurance pension, while achieving justice and equality among the poor categories in terms of financial treatment.

5- To encourage businessmen who are capable of performing charity, social, health and educational projects by honoring and exempting them from a certain amount of taxes.

6- To increase frozen social assistances which are reimbursed in one payment, in order to be utilized in economic projects which increase the standard of the family, whereby it covers the basic costs of the project.

7- To expand the training of entitled citizens who are capable of working in the various crafts and professions and referring them to the training centers, as well as assisting them to carry out income yielding productive projects.

8- To support and develop the institutions which offer childhood services, technically and financially, whether governmental institutions or those falling under private associations.

9- To introduce a new pattern of social care in the form of productive communities system in order to supplement the productive families system, and generalize this system gradually at the villages, random and impoverished areas.

10- To lay down a strategy for housing limited incomers in light of the market economy, based on encouraging migration to the new areas, provided the houses in the new cities are aimed for populating them.

11- To encourage the establishment of small productive and service projects to address unemployment problem, leasing housing units provided the rent value does not exceed 25% of the individual's income, develop housing funds in the governorates to act as the financial pool which undertakes offering support to the beneficiaries, and will have its own resources.

12- To refrain from removing farmers from the houses in which they live and act to make them the owners of these houses, as well discontinue the attachments and the depletion reports issued against a number of government authorities which leads to the imprisonment of farmers, as a result of living in these houses. To discontinue compulsory eviction of farmers from their houses for whatever reason, unless through court verdicts providing an alternative housing to them or rewarding compensations.

13- To developing water and sewerage plants for the purpose of increasing their efficiency, along with the development of the control method in the various treatment phases, provided it is focused on high efficiency plants which do not require vast areas or extensive manpower.

14- To develop public hospital as well as the treatment units in the villages and markaz in connection with the facilities and treatment staff, while laying down an actual control to protect patients against corruption, providing suitable wages to workers in such units to prevent them from exploiting the patients.

15- To expand health insurance services to cover with its protection all citizens, provided the insurance umbrella covers in particular the overall workers and farmers, especially small farmers, tenants and agriculture workers, while not adding new burdens on citizens covered by the health insurance umbrella.

1- To lay down and implement a national plan for positive intervention to promote the political participation of women, including political rehabilitation and education, inviting political parties to intensify their role in this field, as well as allocating seats for women in the parliamentary and local councils for a temporary period, through which women can acquire political experience and prove their merit.

2- To amend a number of legislations which still incorporate discrimination against women in violation of the provisions of the Constitution, including a number of the Penal Code provisions concerned with adultery and the social securities law which deprive the husband from the right to his wife's pension.

3- To pass a new and comprehensive legislation for objective personal status, instead of the applicable laws which were enacted more than 80 years ago, including Law No.25 of 1920, Law No.25 of 1929, and the amendment passed by Law No.100 of 1985, in keeping with the development in the status and role of women in the modern society and guarantee the rights of all members, under the umbrella of the Islamic Shari'a.

4- To prepare a comprehensive study nationwide on the phenomenon of violence against women, including spousal violence, laying down policies and programs to deal with this phenomenon, taking the required measures to provide means of protection and care for the victims of such violence.

5- To intensify programs dedicated to the elimination of the inequality in education, work, training, increasing women's skills to join the labor market, obtain small loans and have access to work in the judicial field in all the common and higher administrative courts, as well as family courts.

1- To consider raising the minimum age for the criminal responsibility of the child to 15 years.

2- To stop incriminating street-children but rather consider them victims for whom the family, the school or social institutions, are accountable.

3- To criminalize employment of children in hazardous jobs, including child labor in the quarries, dry-cleaners and agriculture where they are exposed to health hazardous pesticides and to regulate the work of female house maids.

4- To develop policies and programs which care for the rights of the handicapped children, and guarantee for such children their right to education and all social services.

5- To lay down a legislation which explicitly indicts female genital mutilation (FGM) and promotes awareness of the serious impact of this custom which is being practiced by both Muslim and Christian Egyptians.

6- To consider raising a girl's marriage age from 16 to 18 years in order to protect girls' reproductive health and educational progress.

Including:

1- To introduce human rights education according to its international concept in the primary level, as it is the most influential in forming the fundamental directions of the next generations. This should reflect on the overall policies of the ministries, particularly those related to teacher-trainers and school-curriculum developers:

A- As for the content of school curricula or textbooks used in primary education, it is proposed to address concern to the following :

- Dedicating a course which addresses human rights, its components and significance for the overall development of the community on one hand, and cooperation among nations and peoples and promote peaceful orientation in international dealings on the other hand.

- Asserting the compatibility between international reference points and Arabic and religious points of reference, indicating that any disagreement between them is to do with the interpretation of the rights or the method of implementing them, and not with the content of these rights.

- Using interesting methods and aids for teaching human rights, whether inside classrooms or in the form of intensive discussion sessions on this subject, which will help achieve the principle of the students' participation in the educational process in avoidance of lecturing and rote-learning.

- Providing students with a comparative perspective, through involving civil society agents in teaching these subjects, or even organizing meetings with a number of concerned institutions.

B- As regards preparing teachers and evaluating their performance in the field of teaching human rights, it is proposed to address attention to the following:

- Introducing human rights courses within the academic curricula of faculties of education, including technical education faculties and kindergartens.

- Organizing courses for directors and senior teachers to evaluate the performance of teachers with respect to teaching the observance of human rights. The training program should include familiarization with the teaching methods of human rights in advanced countries.

To improve the school environment to support the practice of human rights through the development of sound nationalism among school students, through the organization and intensification of school activities in which educators, both Muslim and Christian clergymen, and opinion leaders of all denominations and inclinations. Among the activities through which this can be effected are parties, sporting competitions, bulletin boards and activity societies.