Police moved in swiftly and dispersed about 50 protesters, mostly women, who were supporting Lubna Hussein, a former U.N. worker facing 40 lashes on the charge of “indecent dressing.” Some of the women demonstrators wore trousers in solidarity with Hussein while others wore more traditional dress.

Trousers are considered indecent under the strict interpretation of Islamic law, adopted by Sudan’s Islamic regime which came to power after a coup led by President Omar al-Bashir in 1989. But activists and lawyers say the implementation of the law is arbitrary.

Hussein was among 13 women arrested July 3 in a raid by the public order police on a popular cafe in Khartoum. Ten of the women were flogged at a police station two days later and fined 250 Sudanese pounds, or about $120.

But Hussein and two others decided to go on trial. She has sought to publicize her case internationally, inviting human rights workers, Western diplomats and fellow journalists to witness her trial.

“I am not afraid of flogging. … It’s not about flogging. It’s not about my innocence. It’s about changing the law,” Hussein said, speaking to The Associated Press after the hearing Tuesday.

She said she would take the issue all the way to Sudan’s constitutional court if necessary, but that if the court rules against her and orders the flogging, she was ready “to receive (even) 40,000 lashes.”

Hussein wore the same clothes Tuesday she wore when arrested, including the dark-colored pants that authorities found offensive. Although she was required to wear the same outfit to court so the judge and others could see the clothing, Hussein said she’s been wearing it every day to highlight her case.

In the clashes outside the courtroom, witnesses said police wielding batons beat up one of Hussein’s lawyers, Manal Awad Khogali, while keeping media and cameras at bay. No injuries were immediately reported.

“We are here to protest against this law that oppresses women and debases them,” said one of the protesters, Amal Habani, a female columnist for the daily Ajraas Al Hurria, or Bells of Freedom in Arabic.

While the police broke up the demonstration outside the Khartoum Criminal Court, the judge adjourned Hussein’s trial for a month to seek clarification from Sudan’s foreign ministry.

At the time of her arrest, Hussein was working for the media department of the U.N. Mission in Sudan, which gives her immunity from prosecution. She submitted her resignation after her trial began last week because she wanted to go on trial to challenge the dress code law.

Defense lawyer Jalal al-Sayed told reporters Tuesday the judge wanted to know whether Hussein still has immunity because her superiors have not yet accepted the resignation.

Hussein’s hearings first opened last Wednesday but immediately adjourned to give her the opportunity to resign.

Hussein has lauded her supporters, saying they showed that “Sudanese women from different political parties and groupings stand with us.”

The case has drawn criticism from the United Nations. The U.N. Staff Union urged authorities last week not to flog Hussein, calling the punishment cruel, inhuman and degrading.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he was “deeply concerned” about Hussein’s case and said flogging was a violation of international human rights standards.

AP

A 75-year-old widow in Saudi Arabia has been sentenced to 40 lashes and four months in jail for mingling with two young men who are not close relatives, drawing new criticism for the kingdom’s ultraconservative religious police and judiciary.
The woman’s lawyer told The Associated Press on Monday that he would appeal the verdict against Khamisa Sawadi, who is Syrian but was married to a Saudi. The attorney, Abdel Rahman al-Lahem, said the verdict issued March 3 also demands that Sawadi be deported after serving her sentence.

He said his client, who is not serving her sentence yet, was not speaking with the media, and he declined to provide more details about the case.

The newspaper Al-Watan said the woman met with the two 24-year-old men last April after she asked them to bring her five loaves of bread at her home in al-Chamil, a city north of the capital, Riyadh.

Al-Watan identified one man as Fahd al-Anzi, the nephew of Sawadi’s late husband, and the other as his friend and business partner Hadiyan bin Zein. It said they were arrested by the religious police after delivering the bread. The men also were convicted and sentenced to lashes and prison.

The court said it based its ruling on “citizen information” and testimony from al-Anzi’s father, who accused Sawadi of corruption.

“Because she said she doesn’t have a husband and because she is not a Saudi, conviction of the defendants of illegal mingling has been confirmed,” the court verdict read.

Saudi Arabia’s strict interpretation of Islam prohibits men and women who are not immediate relatives from mingling. It also bars women from driving, and the playing of music, dancing and many movies also are a concern for hard-liners who believe they violate religious and moral values.

Complaints from Saudis have been growing that the religious police and courts are overstepping their broad mandate and interfering in people’s lives, and critics lambasted the handling of Sawadi’s case.

“How can a verdict be issued based on suspicion?” Laila Ahmed al-Ahdab, a physician who also is a columnist for Al-Watan, wrote Monday. “A group of people are misusing religion to serve their own interests.”

Sawadi told the court she considered al-Anzi as her son, because she breast-fed him when he was a baby. But the court denied her claim, saying she didn’t provide evidence. In Islamic tradition, breast-feeding establishes a degree of maternal relation, even if a woman nurses a child who is not biologically hers.

Sawadi commonly asked her neighbors for help after her husband died, said journalist Bandar al-Ammar, who reported the story for Al-Watan. In a recent article, he wrote that he felt the need to report the case “so everybody knows to what degree we have reached.”

The woman’s conviction came a few weeks after King Abdullah fired the chief of the religious police and a cleric who condoned killing owners of TV networks that broadcast “immoral content.” The move was seen as part of an effort to weaken the hard-line Sunni Muslim establishment.

Greek-lettered organizations. Their purpose and function can become blurred not only in the eyes of the university, but with its members.

Is Greek life compatible with Christianity?

Recently, a debate over Greek-lettered organizations and their relationship to Christianity has emerged — a debate that goes back at least to the mid-1980s.

The campus of Prairie View A & M University in Prairie View, Texas, experienced this debate firsthand and with full effect: The president of the campus chapter of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc., stepped down and denounced his membership in the organization.

The events began with an opinion piece in the student newspaper, the Panther, “Why God wants you to denounce your letters.”

A student anonymously urged others to denounce their Greek letters or steer clear of Greek-lettered organizations.

He said fraternities and sororities were “idols to themselves and to people who long to be a member of them.” He said these organizations take the place of God in some people’s hearts because they spend time “worshiping” the organizations and not God.

The student said, “demons used the founders of secret societies and Greek/Egyptian organizations to create a stronghold for young people for years to come.” He claimed these demons purposely work against the will of God.

“Organizations encourage members as well as potential members to dedicate all their time and efforts to their success,” he said, which conflicts with God’s will.

The debate lasted until the semester’s end. In response to “Why God wants you to denounce your letters,” the Panther published, “Why God is ONE with my letters.”

The author of that piece, B.J. O’Neal, summarized the opposing arguments as “a common mishap that occurs when religious people err in their understandings or over-interpret human action as it relates to historical events documented in the Bible.” He argued that people should realize that “the true intentions of Greek organizations are in fact aligned with what God would have his people doing.”

O’Neal supported his statements by citing personal experiences and Bible verses.

Fuel was added to the fire when the president of the Eta Gamma Chapter of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc., Asad Abdul-Salaam, stepped down and denounced his fraternity membership. Abdul-Salaam wrote, “Why I denounced my letters.”

Abdul-Salaam condemned Greek images and symbols, and called the rituals “anti-Christian.”

“Asad was a great president,” said Mark Anthony Williams II, the new president of the Eta Gamma Chapter. “He was somebody that I truly looked up to and still do. It takes bravery to work hard and to get somewhere but also to step down due to religious reasons. I don’t know a lot of people that would do that.”

“We, as Alphas, don’t look at him differently. We don’t talk about him behind his back. I still love Asad to death,” Williams said. “If he believes his walk with God will be greater, it’s not for us to judge. Asad is not a sporadic guy; it was something well thought out.”

However, Williams said, “I personally know a lot of people that are extremely involved in church — preachers, deacons, mothers — and it’s all about how you personally portray your letters,” he said. “Your organization may be flawed, but you can try to help it become better and [get] back to its original intent.”

Williams said it would be better to have written about how Greek life has digressed from its original path.

The Rev. Kenneth I. Clarke Sr., a member of Alpha Phi Alpha and director of Cornell United Religious Work at Cornell University, traces the current debate to such ministers as Frederic Hatchett and Gail Gray, who condemn Greek-lettered organizations.

Hatchett is the founder of the Web site www.dontgogreek.com and author of “Coming Apart at the Seams: Biblically Unravelling the Evils of Sororities and Fraternities.” On his Web site, he claims to have 21 years of “experience” with Greek-lettered organizations, “six years as an outsider looking in, five as an insider, 10 and counting as a born again, denounced member.”

Hatchett says the origin of these organizations can be found in the “Ancient Cults of Babylon,” which can be proved in “SEVEN undeniable similarities between Ancient Babylonian Cults and Greek Organizations today.”

Gray is the author of “Greek-Letter Organizations: Offspring of Abomination.” Her mission is to teach about “the spiritual conflict surrounding Christian membership within secret societies,” according to her Web site, www.gailgray.com.

Clarke says of these critics, “They take text [from the Bible] that supports their case with a snip of a ritual and say it’s evidence. You can’t take a quote out of an initiation without putting it into context,” Clarke said.

Clarke said he finds this difficult to do if you have not been a part of a Greek-letter organization because, he said, members understand the symbolism behind the rituals.

“For example, I shouldn’t know what a Kappa ritual means as an Alpha any more than a Kappa should know about Alpha’s rituals,” he said.

He also said, “some of the language of the rituals are used symbolically and not to be taken literally.”

He maintains that some rituals have been handed down throughout history and have historical hreferences or hreferences to African culture.

“I have never had to make a decision between Alpha Phi Alpha and my faith,” Clarke said. “No one is asked to serve something else other than God, just have a commitment to your organization.”

Clarke said he is concerned that this debate will affect younger members who do not have tight grasp on their organization’s history or black history.

Thus, Clarke says it is essential for older members and graduate members to converse with the younger ones and help them to have a better grasp of their organization’s past and of the purposes on which they were founded.

“These arguments are problematic,” he said. “Christianity, as well as other religions, are most potent, most transformative when they clarify what they stand for as opposed to misguided interpretations of faith that speak about what they are against.”

[via The Black College Wire]

When our correspondent visited the school in the afternoon, the Vice Principal, Hajiya Hadiza Ali Gombe revealed that the teacher who was employed on contract, was assigned to invigilate the SS 1 classes who were writing their Islamic Religious Knowledge (IRK) exams.
The principal added that the teacher suspected that a foul play was about to take place as one of the students wanted to come into the exam hall with his books. She (teacher) was said to have collected the books and threw them outside the class, unknown to her that there was a copy of the Holy Quran among the books.

She said before they knew what was happening, the students started shouting ‘Allahu Akbar’. It was gathered that all efforts at controlling the rampaging students proved abortive. She said all efforts by the school Principal, Moh-ammed Sadiq to protect the teacher in his office also failed.

According to her, in the ensuing fracas, the principal was also terribly beaten and injured while the students set the teacher’s car, three classes, school clinic administrative block and library on fire reducing everything to ashes.

When THISDAY contacted the state Police Comm-issioner, Barrister Joseph Ahmed Ibi on the incident, he confirmed that 12 people have been arrested in connection with the gruesome killing of the teacher adding that the police was still investigating the incident.
However, it was reliably gathered that all schools in Gombe metropolis have been temporarily closed down, while peace was gradually returning to the town, as at the time of filing this report.

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