‘The whole story is false,’ N.D.G. mosque says
Refutes TV report it wanted women barred from work site on Fridays
The head of an organization overseeing electrical work near two mosques in Côte-des-Neiges said there’s no contract barring women from working on the construction site on Fridays, the Muslim day of prayers.
“We never received any request from the mosque or anyone else to remove women from the work site,” said Serge Boileau, director of the Commission des services électriques de Montréal, which is responsible for installing underground electrical cables in Montreal.
“I spoke to the owner of the company doing work for us and they never received (a request) either. We have good relations with the owner of the mosques.”
Boileau was responding to a controversial report on TVA Nouvelles claiming that mosque officials had forced both an excavation company, G-Tek, and the signals company working for them, Map Signalisation, to make sure only men would be working on the construction site outside the mosques on Fridays.
In the report, G-Tek is said to have a written contract that stipulates the unusual condition, though the contract is not presented.
Boileau said there are many “falsehoods” in the report, adding that he’s confused about why people are saying such a contract exists.
“There’s a lot of confusion and it’s very bizarre,” Boileau said of the controversy.
TVA never called the commission before broadcasting the report, he said.
A commission employee in charge of inspecting the work on de Courtrai Ave. is a woman and she has never heard of the request either, he said.
Boileau said he’s surprised that his organization has been dragged into the controversy, which has snowballed since the report was first broadcast on Tuesday.
Quebec’s Labour minister has asked the Commission de la construction du Québec to investigate, the far-right group La Meute has called for a demonstration outside the mosques on Friday, and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard said if the report is true, it would be unacceptable.
“It remains to be seen who said what to whom. It’s not entirely clear this morning,” he said.
The commission, and the company doing the work, do have an agreement with the Ahl-ill-Bait Mosque to do electrical work on its property. As part of the agreement, construction workers refrain from working on mosque property during Friday prayers to cut down on noise. Boileau said the request is understandable.
The sidewalk in front of both mosques has been ripped up and workers are laying new underground electrical cables.
The Ahl-ill-Bait Mosque put out a statement on Wednesday saying it had never requested that women be excluded from the construction site in front of its building.
“The mosque has had good relations with the contractor since the beginning of the project,” said Moayed Altalibi, a member of the board of directors.
In its statement, the mosque says the TVA report is false and said it contributes “to the social breakdown between Quebecers of Muslim and non-Muslim faiths.”
“We hope the facts will be re-established so that we can continue to build bridges between our communities,” the statement says.
Altalibi said mosque officials did ask that parking spots be available at lunch hour on Fridays, but never asked for anyone to be excluded from the construction site.
“This request, if it exists, does not come from our organization,” he said.
William Korbatly, a lawyer representing the mosque, said mosque officials called the police on Wednesday after receiving many nasty messages, including one from someone who had threatened to burn down the mosque.
“They are afraid,” Korbatly said of his clients.
He called the TVA report “fake news” and said it was based on false allegations.
“We even asked members of the mosque if someone asked verbally (for women to be excluded), and everyone said no,” he said.
A spokesperson for the construction commission said investigators spoke with five employees working on the construction site on Wednesday and plan to meet seven more people on Thursday.
“We looked at some documents, including contracts, and we didn’t find any clauses that relate to women,” said Simon-Pierre Pouliot, the commission’s director of communications.
“There are things that happen in the contract, but we have to see what happened on the ground — were things said?”
Amar Amir, a manager of the Ahl-Ill-Bait Mosque, told the Montreal Gazette that “the whole story is false.”
“We don’t care who’s working outside, a man or a woman, who cares?” he said. “No one has the right to say if it’s a woman or a man ... We are in Canada in 2017, not in Kandahar. No one here has this mentality.”
We even asked members of the mosque if someone asked verbally (for women to be excluded), and everyone said no.