KUWAIT (Islam Online)-Kuwaiti Islamist MPs slammed Education Minister Yussef al-Ibrahim after the staging of an all-female, "anti-Islamic" school play in front of a mixed-sex audience.
"The staging of the play contravenes Islamic Shari’a law and is something that cannot be tolerated," charged hardline Islamist MP Walid al-Tabtabai, who urged al-Ibrahim to apologize.
Tabtabai, who was in the audience at Taima High School for Girls in Jahra, some 20 kilometers (12 miles) west of Kuwait City, told Al-Qabas newspaper his main objection was that the budding actresses' heads and upper chests were uncovered while men were watching. He also charged that the content of "A Hat Without a Head" helped serve "anti-Islamic ideology."
Fellow MP Mohammad al-Busairi has threatened to grill al-Ibrahim while adding that a number of the girls' parents had lodged complaints with the Education Ministry for "making their daughters act in the play."
But several students were due to march on the National Assembly to protest the slander campaign to which they have been subjected. Outspoken veteran liberal MP Abdullah al-Naibari, meanwhile, told the daily that Islamist MPs were "fishing in troubled waters," charging that they had an ulterior motive.
"It is no secret that the Muslim Brotherhood and its allies have taken opposing positions to the ministers of education, information and oil because of their personalities and not their performances," al-Naibari said.
But al-Ibrahim received little support from the official Teachers' Association, who claimed "his course of action since taking office is a culmination of an organized and serious plan to work against all educational traditions, customs and norms."
Kuwait remains a religiously conservative country, where alcohol and discos are banned. In July 1997, the Information Ministry banned all public music concerts or shows that contravene Shari’a law and Kuwaiti traditions, in line with parliamentary recommendations.
