By Adnan Shabrawi

Okaz/Saudi Gazette

JEDDAH — The Ministry of Justice announced the beginning of issuing online marriage contracts through its website. The ministry introduced this major reform to facilitate, simplify and speed up procedures of marriage, as well as to shorten the time and reduce efforts in order to ensure all the procedures of marriage are done in a legal way.

Well informed sources told Okaz/Saudi Gazette that the ministry’s new service allows the completion of all the procedures of issuing e-marriage contract through its platform with ease through the registration of the spouses’ data, then choose the marriage official and the date and place, and document the contract electronically through the system.

The sources stated that the contract cannot be concluded without bringing the pre-marital medical report of the would-be bride and bridegroom, issued by an accredited hospital. In the case of re-marriage of a divorced woman, a copy of the divorce certificate shall be produced so as to ensure that the iddah (period a woman must observe after the death of her husband or after a divorce) is over and she is in no way related to her first husband.

The sources stated that the e-marriage contract certificate will be issued after submission of fingerprint of all parties involved in the contract, filling up of the data of husband and wife with attachment of files related to the marriage contract, conditions of husband and wife, statements of witnesses and the wife’s guardian plus details of dowry.

According to the ministry website, the number of marriage contracts registered during the month of Shaban 1440 reached over 13,000, an increase of six percent, comparing with the same month last year. Saudi couples represented 33 percent of the total marriage contracts issued across the Kingdom.

Around 46 percent of the total marriage contracts were issued in Makkah and Riyadh regions while the number of daily marriage contracts ranged between 392 and 1,457.