AZIZA DINI
34, Quebec Green Party candidate in the riding of La Pinière, the first woman in a hijab to officially announce plans to run for the National Assembly
On why she decided to get in to politics:
"For me it’s an opportunity to express myself, to say we Muslim women who wear the veil, we are free women too, regardless of our religious choices. We’re free women, we have the right to flourish in our professional lives and no one has the right to tell us how we should show our faith ...
On how she feels about her decision:
“I’m very proud of this. It’s an opportunity for me to say to those people who think that Muslim women are oppressed and that they have no choices in their lives — no. I’m a Muslim woman. I’m veiled. I have the right to choose to get into politics. It’s not easy in politics for women, whether
they’re Muslim or not. And for veiled Muslim women, it’s even harder. So I want to dispel the prejudices against these women. And I wanted to get into politics so that I can defend myself. We don’t want someone else to defend us."
On what it’s like to be the first hijab-wearing Muslim woman running for provincial office:
“It’s not easy in the sense that I always have to explain myself, I always have to answer questions that don’t even make sense. For example, as a member of the Green Party of Quebec, I share all the party’s values. But the questions I get asked are often very personal, that have nothing to do with what I want to contribute or what I want to do in the future. They just see what I’m wearing. Which is too bad. And what’s also too bad is that we just keep talking about this. Election after election, we talk about immigrants, we talk about minorities, we talk about Muslims like we don’t have any real problems in society to deal with.”
On what she thinks of the political discourse in Quebec related to Muslims, especially Muslim women:
"Sometimes it makes me laugh ... Sometimes it makes me angry because they’re talking about me. They’re talking about many women. They ’re speaking in our name to say that we’re oppressed, that we don’t have freedoms, this and that. It’s not the reality. It’s not my reality. It’s not the reality of the many, many women who wear the veil. There are certainly women who are oppressed, but not because they wear the veil. Not because they ’re Muslim. It can be any woman, in any context.”
I wanted to get into politics so that I can defend myself.