BBC: Mali protest against women's law
BBC: Tens of thousands of people in Mali’s capital, Bamako, have been protesting against a new law which gives women equal rights in marriage. [...] One of the most contentious issues in the new legislation is that women are no longer required to obey their husbands.
Hadja Sapiato Dembele of the National Union of Muslim Women’s Associations said the law goes against Islamic principles. “We have to stick to the Koran,” Ms Dembele told the BBC’s Focus on Africa programme. “A man must protect his wife, a wife must obey her husband. It’s a tiny minority of women here that wants this new law – the intellectuals. The poor and illiterate women of this country – the real Muslims – are against it.”
When tens of thousands of Muslims at one location (and unknown numbers at other locations) protest for less individual rights and responsibilities, when a national leader goes on the record equating Islam with poverty and illiteracy (as if these were virtues), I am less able to understand how anyone can see Islam as compatable with the West. I am less able to understand how anyone can see the fundamentals of Islam practiced by a majority as a misinterpretation of Islam practiced by a minority. I understand less each day.
