Divorce Rates Surge in Morocco Following COVID-19 Lockdown, Lawyers Report

According to three lawyers specializing in family law contacted by Médias24, confinement has contributed to aggravating marital tensions, which have resulted, after deconfinement, in a plethora of divorce applications before the courts.

Would this increase in the number of divorce requests be due to confinement or rather to the suspension of judicial activities during the period, thus blocking the filing of divorce applications until deconfinement?

Unanimously, the three lawyers stated that confinement has allowed some couples to discover their antipathy. "Confinement has only exacerbated tensions that already existed... But there are a lot of women who have been married for forty or fifty years who can’t take it anymore and want to break their marriage. That’s unheard of...," says Me Khadija Amrani, one of the lawyers interviewed.

For Me Meriem Berrada, "confinement has been very trying for everyone, including couples... Especially when the couple didn’t necessarily get married for the right reasons."

According to Me Kenza Mansouri, the family court in Casablanca has been receiving 190 to 200 divorce cases per day for judicial divorce proceedings and 180 cases on average each week for amicable divorces since July 15, the date of resumption of filing of divorce applications, an increase of 20 to 30% compared to the same period last year.

"With the upcoming judicial vacations (August and mid-September), the hearings held this July are postponed to September or October... Depending on the number of cases set by the judge per day, some will have their hearing set in a week; the others, the following week...," specifies Me Kenza Mansouri.

For the lawyer, who does not make a link between confinement and the increase in divorce applications, "no procedure has been filed for four months". And she adds that "the conclusion can therefore be biased, because not all couples who had difficulties separated".