Rights of working women in Qatar Thursday, 14 April 2011 01:29

Human Resources Law No 8 / 2009 points out the role of woman as a partner of man in the family and the development of the society, and harmonise between her duty towards the family as a wife, mother and her desire to engage herself in work. She is half of the society and the law gave her many advantages, including maternity and child care leave and the leave for the legitimate waiting period (iddah) after the death of her husband.

The human resources law granted the female employee maternity leave with full salary for a period of sixty days which will not be counted as other leaves with the condition that she provides the medical report or an attested copy of the birth certificate of the child which proves the maternity.

The female employee will be granted two hours daily for feeding the child for one year immediately following the end of the maternity leave and the matter of fixing the feeding time will be left for the employee.

The president may grant the female Qatari employee leave to care of her children with disabilities who are younger than the age of six, twice in the duration of her service and for a maximum period of three years each time.

Taking into account the requirements of the public interest, the President of the Council of Ministers, may grant in estimated case that the female employee leave to take care of her children and in all cases, the leave will be with full salary in the first three years and half of the total salary after this period.

The female Muslim employee whose husband dies will be granted the leave for the legitimate waiting period (iddah) with full salary for a period of four months and ten days from the date of her husband’s death or till she gives birth if she is pregnant and this will not affect her other leaves and the employee or someone on her behalf must inform the working agency about incident of the death of her husband and to provide proof of his death

While The Labour Law No. 14/2004 on the employment of women pointed out the equality of woman working with the man while doing the same work and giving her the salary equal to man’s salary and provided her training and promotion opportunities in addition to prohibiting the women to employ in dangerous and hard works or the works harmful to their health or morals.

Regarding maternity leave the Labour Law No. 14/2004 points out that the female employee with passing of one full year in the service of the employer has the right to get maternity leave with full payment for a period of 50 days which covers pre and post delivery period with condition that the period after delivery is not less than 25 days.

Leave will be granted on the basis of medical certificate issued by licensed physician stating probable date of the delivery. If the remaining period of the leave after delivery is less than thirty days, the female employee may be granted complementary leave from her yearly leave otherwise the complimentary period will be considered leave without pay. If the health condition of the female employee after delivery prevents her to return to the job after ending of its said leave in previous paragraph it will be considered as leave without pay with the condition that the period of interruption from the job does not exceed 60 days continuously or intermittently. And with the condition of presenting a medical certificate of her health condition issued by a licensed physician. And getting the maternity leave will not detract her right in her other leaves.

And the law adds that the breastfeeding employee must be granted time for breastfeeding everyday, for one year effected from ending of maternity leave and the time fixing for breastfeeding will be left for employee, and period of breastfeeding will be counted as working hours.

Finally, employer cannot terminate contract of the job of the female employee due to her marriage or obtaining the leave provided by the law and he also can neither notify her to terminate her employment contract, during these leaves nor send to her notice of ending of her employment period during the period.