(Rabat) Out of nowhere, Morocco yesterday (09/01/2017) banned the Burka from being sold for security reasons with a Government official relating to the media:
'We have taken the step of completely banning the import, manufacture and marketing of this garment in all the cities and towns of the kingdom,'Traders have been issued notices to stop making and selling burqas and to liquidate their stock within 48 hours. When asked if the wearing of the Burka is to be banned, the official remained silent.
However whilst the Burka is associated as an Afghanistan import, quite a few people in the country are angry at this so called clamp down on free expression:
data-lang="en-gb">Banning a part of your culture, your history, to try to imitate others yet more, it’s truly pathetic.
Interdire une partie de sa culture, de son histoire, pour toujours plus tenter de ressembler aux autres, tellement pathétique.— Badubai (@badubaii) 10 January 2017
Responding to suggestions that the burqa is an “Afghan
import”, however, the Moroccan religious activist Hassan al-Katani criticized what he
called the “racist differentiation” of “letting women wear clothes of the
latest European fashion but banning them from wearing Eastern styles”.
Al-Katani condemned the new law in several posts on his official Facebook page.
Hammad Kabbadj whose candidacy for legislative election was
rejected by the Ministry of the Interior because his views were deemed too
extremist, finds it “unfair” to prohibit the integral veil while the “western”
bikini is considered an unalienable right. “It is unacceptable to forbid
citizens from wearing the oriental niqab, or to interfere in its marketing,”
