 Kuwait's hard-line Islamists, citing foreign interference, have embarked on a counteroffensive in the face of a determined government-led drive to grant disenfranchised women their suffrage. The anti-women rights campaign kicked off late Tuesday with a public rally hosted by tribal Islamist lawmaker Daifallah Buramya under the slogan that "based on Islamic Sharia law, women have no political rights."
| "They're like cattle. They don't have working brains, y'know. And they have those titties..." |
Buramya vowed to oppose a government-sponsored draft law that would grant women the right to vote and run for public office, citing fatwas, or religious edicts, that prohibit participation of Muslim women in politics. "Ninety percent of Kuwaiti women reject political rights because they know it is against religion," said the lawmaker who warned MPs of a "big shame" if they approved the bill.
| "They like being cattle. Really. They just graze around the house, chewing their little cuds..." |
The leader of the fundamentalist Islamic Salaf Alliance, Khaled al-Issa, criticized liberals and what he branded "agents of some foreign embassies," who are trying to distance Muslims from their religion by forcing women's rights. "The Constitution must represent the will of the Kuwaiti people and not foreign demands to change the political course we have chosen," said Issa, speaking at the same rally.
| "And women aren't people! You can tell! They have those soft thighs, not like a man's, y'know..." |
More rallies are scheduled before Parliament votes on the draft legislation and Islamist activists have started using SMS text messages in their campaign. Kuwait's Islamist Ummah Party, however, announced on Feb. 21 its total backing for women's full political rights, becoming the first Sunni Muslim group in the Gulf emirate to support women's suffrage.
| "It's gonna come, and we don't want to look like the stick-in-the-muds, because when they vote, we want them to vote for us." |
A second group, the Islamic Constitutional Movement, or Muslim Brotherhood, said it was still considering the issue as some of its leaders have publicly supported women's right to vote. The bill, approved by the Cabinet last May, calls for amending the election law, which limits voting and candidacy to Kuwaiti males while the emirate's Constitution stipulates complete gender equality. |