Egyptian-American Marriage: Understanding the Legal Process

When I first thought about writing this article, I decided to help those Egyptians who plan to marry or got married already with non-Egyptians in Egypt, especially Americans, and go through headaches suffering from being lost in the circle of papers and applications.

I also wrote this article because I didn't find similar articles talking about same subject that provide trusted information online, and whenever you search or ask someone for help you find nothing make you rest your soul and mind.

What I am sure about Foreigners Marriage is it's not easy to do it, specially after the political situations in the Middle East. The first step by logic is to visit the marriage office at the Egyptian Ministry of Justice, and there you will discover that the marriage office can't help you to get married from American citizen unless you have an approve of the marriage from U.S. Embassy at Egypt, and also another resident type different from the tourist resident on the passport. and you will be shocked if you visit the US Embassy and listen to what they say, they will tell you that the U.S. government does not have legal authority to approve or object to the marriage of American citizens, and you can read about this at the U.S. Embassy website by the title " Marriage In Egypt ", so.. now I think you understand what I mean!.. and its not logic at all that they as you at the marriage Office for a different type of resident on your partner passport, because simply how you can get it?

You will find yourself in the middle of the gap between the U.S. Embassy and the marriage office at the Egyptian Ministry of Justice.

The way out of this

There is two ways out of this situation, the 1st is to hire a lawyer to deal with this problem at the Family Court and help your self to get marriage papers. And this will take like 3 months minimum and the cost will depend on how much your lawyer ask and can get from your pocket. Some of lawyers will ask from 2.000 up to 8.000 Egyptian pounds, and if you have a friend who is working as a lawyer it will be the best choice, because he can save lots of money from yours, and it will cost you around 350 Egyptian pounds only.

The 2nd way is to do it your self, simply by going to the Family Court in your area, and apply for marriage by providing 2 papers only, one of it is a valid marriage paper called " Zawag Orfy " paper. And it should has both photos and finger prints of the married couple, and signed by two witnesses. And the other paper is the request to the court, and this request called " action approval of marriage relation ship " and it can be provided by any of the partners, but for sure it would be better if the Egyptian partner apply it, because its much easier than involved in English applications and need to translate them in Arabic and getting approvals before providing them to the court, and definitely you will need a lawyer to help you with that. So try to keep a way from this headache.

Anyways.. You will find thousands of people who can help you to write down these two papers and print them if you don't have a small printer attached to your computer to print them out, but remember to make some copies just in case you need them.

After you Apply

At the Family court, and after you file your they will give you a date to stand before the court, probably will be in the same month or next month, depending on the court roll, both partners should be there at that date in front of the Judge, this will help lost to make the case take a faster action, and the non-Egyptian partner will sign the papers in front of the judge.

The judge will ask your partner a few smile questions about if he/she knew why he/she is here in the court, and if he/she did that by self motivation and not forced. And the person should say the truth and just answer the questions directly. Its not a big deal at all, its only a way to make the judge sure that everything is fine, and after that the judge will give you another date for judgment.

I extremely advice that you be ready with your translator too, just in case the judge doesn't speak English, because most of judges in Egypt really don't know anything about English, but of course not all of them.

The judgment date

Notice that this date that judge gave to you in almost all cases will not be the date that the judge will sign your marriage papers, its not a must, because almost all cases are delayed for judgment in another date after the first date, it should be in the same or the next month, and you don't have to show up at the court again because you applied and your partner signed, so.. it's the judge turn to sign.

I am sure if you do it by your self, you will not spend more than 100 Egyptian pounds, and that means, it will take around 3 months to get your marriage papers in your hands, and your wide smile back again!