Indonesia: Women prefer divorce to polygamy in Islamic courts

A lot of young girls in Afghanistan prefer to douse themselves with gas and burn themselves to death then to get married to someone who could be their grandfather. AKI

Jakarta, 2 Feb. (AKI) - A growing number of Muslim women are choosing to file for divorce rather than continue in a polygamous marriage, according to data from Islamic courts in Indonesia.

The number of women who cited polygamy as a reason for seeking divorce rose from 813 in 2004 to over 1,000 in 2006, according to Nasaruddin Umar, senior representative of Indonesia's religious affairs ministry.

“There has been a significant increase in divorce because women have been rejecting polygamy in recent years,” he said, quoted by the Indonesian daily, The Jakarta Post.

Umar said he believed the number of divorce cases linked to disputes over polygamous marriages increased again in 2008 and would continue to rise throughout 2009.