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The New Nation -
Bangladesh's Independent News Source
By
V Radhika
Sep 6, 2004, 11:51
Recently, the Ontario government in Canada
announced that it would review plans to use Islamic law to settle
family disputes. While this was not exactly what Homa Arjamand,
Coordinator of the International Campaign against Sharia in Canada,
and other women activists wanted to hear, the fact that the government
agreed for a review, marks a minor victory. Activists like Arjomand
and Alia Hogben of the Canadian Council for Muslim Women (CCMW) would
rather that the plan is disbanded altogether.
On June 10, 2004, Attorney-General Michael
Bryant said, "We are looking at what the options are, aware of the
fact that it (an institute that plans to apply the Sharia law) will
not be up and running till later this year..."
The controversy arose after the Islamic
Institute for Civil Justice asked for the setting up of Islamic or
Sharia courts in Ontario. This demand implies that marriage, family
and business disputes would be settled according to Sharia, a body of
laws and rules "inspired" by the Quran and not by the laws of Canada.
Arjomand and Hogben however, disagree
entirely. Such courts, they say, will be detrimental to women's
interests; and there is no need for these when women have access to a
progressive Canadian legal system that ensures women's equality. They
also dismiss the contention of Sharia law proponents, that
participation of women in these proceedings will be purely voluntary.
The activists argue that there is a high
possibility of women being
"If Sharia courts were to function here
(in Canada)," says Arjomand, "many women will be socially and
psychologically coerced into participating. To refuse would mean
rejection by their families, the community, or worse."
Arjomand marshals her experience as a
transitional counsellor with women particularly immigrant women and
refugees, many of whom come from countries that enforce Sharia law, to
buttress this claim. This one-time professor of medical physics in
Iran was forced to flee her country; her family arrived in Canada in
1989 as refugees.
"But that was not reason to deny the
Islamic Institute the right to use the Arbitration Act", he said.
© Copyright 2003 by The New Nation
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