The President of the Muslim Executive Committee for Belgium (EMB) has suspended the auxiliary imam at a Leuven mosque.
He is accused of making “unacceptable” statements, it was revealed on Friday evening. This comes after a Het Laatste Nieuws article claimed the imam said a man could “strike his wife lightly if she misbehaved” during a sermon.
The sermon Het Laatste Nieuws referred to happened in November last year. It was made by the auxiliary imam at the Wilsele mosque in Leuven (Flemish Brabant).
The Flemish paper claimed the imam said a man could strike his wife lightly if she misbehaved, if other methods didn’t work. However, he couldn’t hit her “on the face or intimate areas”.
“This type of statement is unacceptable as it legitimises violence against women”, the EMB said on Friday evening.
An EMB Commission questioned the imam who made the sermon. “While waiting for the conclusions of the internal inquiry, the President of the EMB and the EMB’s Theological Council have decided to suspend the imam as a preventative measure”, the EMB said. The EMB is the body that represents Muslims in Belgium. [The Brussels Times] Read more
