RULING DENOUNCED BY MUSLIM GROUP Controversy is unfounded, activist says – women remove their veils when necessary
‘IF I WAS WEARING A FACE VEIL … I’D BE SCARED TO VOTE’
RULING DENOUNCED BY MUSLIM GROUP Controversy is unfounded, activist says – women remove their veils when necessary
ANDY BLATCHFORD CANADIAN PRESS
A Muslim woman says the abrupt change to Quebec election rules for veiled voters will fuel a growing hostility toward Muslim women in the province.
“If I was wearing a face veil I likely wouldn’t go and vote on Monday,” Sarah Elgazzar of the Council on American-Islamic Relations Canada said in an interview yesterday. “I’d be scared.” A ruling by chief returning officer Marcel Blanchet on Friday means the face of anyone who votes Monday must be visible before a ballot is cast. That includes Muslim women, a scenario Elgazzar believes will keep many at home on election day.
Elgazzar said there has never been a problem with Muslim women who wear face veils.
“These women regularly uncover their faces to identify themselves, and they never asked for any kind of accommodation,” she said. “This controversy kind of hunted them down and they didn’t have anything to do with it.”
The issue blew into the open a few days ago when the Journal de Montréal published a story saying Muslim women could vote tomorrow even if their faces were covered.
Blanchet then changed the rules after he received threatening phone calls and read reports that some citizens were planning to wear masks to the polls.
Elgazzar said Muslim women who wear veils show their faces when necessary, including visits to banks, crossing the border and when dealing with police.
She said the current Quebec environment is “very hostile” toward veiled Muslim women.
“People here have the impression that they (Muslim women) weren’t ready to comply and that they (Quebecers) have won some kind of victory,” she said of Blanchet’s ruling.
Elections Quebec spokesperson Denis Dion said all voters will have to show a piece of photo identification at polling stations. If they don’t have photo ID, they must provide two other pieces of ID and sign a document before being able to vote.
He said there is no guarantee female returning officers will be available to check the identification of veiled Muslim women at polling stations.
Debate over reasonable accommodation of racial, cultural and religious minorities has surfaced several times during the election campaign, with Action démocratique du Québec leader Mario Dumont often leading the charge. Dumont has been hoping to tap into the unease many small-c conservative Quebecers feel about how far the province goes to accommodate ethnic minorities.
(Farhat Mirza, 25, vice-president of the Council for the Advancement of Muslim Professionals in Montreal, posed with her niqab yesterday. Farhat, who normally only wears the niqab for religious activities, says she plans to wear it more in the future.)
