Quebec's chief electoral officer Marcel Blanchet has reversed his decision to allow Muslim women to vote without having to lift their face veils to identify themselves.
Originally, Blanchet had ruled that Muslim women could vote without doffing the femme mask to show that they are who they say they are and that their ID's conform, but widespread protests led to him changing his mind, in spite of death threats and angry rhetoric.
The election is extremely close,with the three main parties in what amounts to a dead heat.
The issue hit a raw nerve in a province that has been enmeshed for months in acrimonious talks over accommodating Muslims.
In Montreal, meanwhile, The LCN TV network reported that Blanchet's office had received death threats. Karine Lacoste, a spokeswoman for Mr. Blanchet, said he now has two bodyguards.
1 comment:
the tradition of wearing the veil obviously comes from lands not accustomed to the polling process.
If someone not muslim cannot wear the veil, then muslims should not be able to either.... no special accomodations for religion.
BTW... this could probably be avoided if they had more biometric ID/security. I am sure a retina scan /fingerprint scan/dna test could be more useful than poll workers seeing if this person matches their ID.
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