Islamic students' rally unnecessary “ RMIT

[BB-Leo]

Islamic students’ rally unnecessary – RMIT

MEDIA RELEASE

Islamic students’ rally unnecessary – RMIT



March 22, 2009



RMIT University has described as unfortunate and unnecessary a planned Islamic student rally demanding more Muslim prayer spaces, given that the University already provides eight Muslim prayer rooms, with RMIT Training opening an additional Muslim room. The RMIT Islamic Society is demanding that two multi-faith prayer rooms within the University’s City campus Spiritual Centre, to which Muslim staff and students already receive preferential access, be designated as Muslim-only. The society intends to rally on campus tomorrow (Monday). RMIT currently provides eight Muslim prayer rooms – two (male and female) on the City campus in Bourke Street, two on the Brunswick campus and four on the Bundoora campus. The rooms have ablution facilities. RMIT Training has opened an addi
tional Muslim prayer room to meet demand caused by growing student numbers at its Swanston Street premises. The University’s policy is that prayer rooms in its Spiritual Centre are multi-faith, open to bookings by members of all faiths. Major renovations to RMIT’s Building 9 on the City campus led to the demolition of Muslim prayer space in 2007. Despite the continuing provision of Muslim prayer rooms on the City campus and the offer of a guaranteed booking for two prayer rooms at the Spiritual Centre, the Islamic student society has been conducting a boycott campaign. Dr Maddy McMaster, Acting Pro Vice-Chancellor (Students), said RMIT was a secular institution focused on education, which respected the rights of those of its 65,000 students and 3,500 staff who practise a religion and provided quality resources to support them. “Our chaplaincy staff includes the Imam of the West Heidelberg Mosque, Riad Galil, who is a teacher and a member of the committee of the Jewish Christian Muslim Association,â┚¬
she said. “With space at a premium on our City campus, we have bent over backwards to find an amicable solution. Our offers to the Islamic student society have gone more than half-way. RMIT has eight Muslim prayer rooms, as well as providing Muslim students with preferential access to two prayer rooms in its multi-faith Spiritual Centre. “Gestures of good faith from the University have been rejected. Multi-faith spaces are commonly accepted as supporting a range of religious practices, including those of the Muslim faith. It is disappointing that the RMIT Islamic Society chooses to reject established multi-faith principles.â┚¬

AAP

 

[Whitebear]

Re: Islamic students’ rally unnecessary – RMIT

Students at RMIT University in Melbourne protest over lack of Muslim prayer rooms

MELBOURNE Muslim university students will protest tomorrow, saying they are being sexually harassed and discriminated against due to a lack of prayer rooms.

But RMIT University management deny this, insisting Muslim students are well catered for.

The RMIT Islamic Society want Muslim-only prayer rooms on the university's city campus.

In late 2007, construction work on the building that contained a dedicated Muslim prayer room meant the facility was demolished.
The Islamic society said the university reneged on its promise to replace that with another room.

"As a result, students and staff have been forced to pray outside in the heat
of summer and the cold of winter," the society's website said.

It alleged females have been subjected to sexual abuse, harassment and religious vilification while praying.

They are now forced to pray two at a time in cramped women's rooms, corridors and empty classrooms.

The society said "enough is enough", insisting it was sick of being given the run around and would hold a mass protest at the university on Monday afternoon.

"No longer can we remain quiet and have students compromise between their safety and prayers, RMIT made a promise, it must fulfil it," the website said.

But the university described the action as "unfortunate and unnecessary".

There are already eight Muslim prayer rooms across the university's three campuses, Dr Maddy McMaster, Acting Pro Vice-Chancellor (Students) said.

"The university's policy is that prayer rooms in its spiritual centre are multi-faith, open to bookings by members of all faiths," she said.

Muslims get preferential access to two of
those rooms.

"With space at a premium on our city campus, we have bent over backwards to find an amicable solution," she said.
Gestures of good faith have been rejected, she insisted.

"Multi-faith spaces are commonly accepted as supporting a range of religious practices, including those of the Muslim faith.

"It is disappointing that the RMIT Islamic Society chooses to reject established multi-faith principles," she said.

The society did not respond to AAP requests for comment.



Muslim students accuse RMIT of 'bad faith' over prayer centre

March 13, 2009

RMIT faces an international Muslim backlash over a 16-month dispute about dedicated prayer rooms at the Swanston Street campus, a student Muslim leader said yesterday.

Some Muslims had already left RMIT for Vic
toria University, and others had complained to their embassies they were not getting the facilities the university had promised, RMIT Islamic Society president Mohamed Elrafihi said.

Muslims have been boycotting the multi-faith facilities and praying wherever they can.

Some women had been sexually abused and harassed while praying, Mr Elrafihi said.

The society's women's vice-president, Fardowsa Mohamed, said at least one student left the university and the country after being sexually harassed. "That means the rest of us are scared and don't feel safe," she said.

The dispute began in late 2007 when dedicated prayer rooms for male and female Muslims were closed while the building was extended.

New ones were promised for the beginning of the 2008 academic year but Muslims were then told the rooms were not exclusively theirs.

Mr Elrafihi said the rooms, designed by a Muslim architect, were set out as prayer rooms, with Koranic inscript
ions, ablution facilities and rugs facing Mecca.

He said they were told the rooms were theirs only from 11.30am to 5pm, Monday to Friday (covering only one or two of the five daily prayers), and other times by appointment.

Christian and Jewish student groups, the student union and outside Islamic groups have supported the Muslims on campus.
"Our problem is not multi-faith, it is that RMIT have not acted in good faith, they reneged on their promise for dedicated prayer rooms," Mr Elrafihi said.

"It is a justice issue." RMIT pro vice-chancellor (students) Joyce Kirk said through a spokesman the spiritual centre had always been a multi-faith facility, including the new prayer rooms.

Professor Kirk said the university's position had not changed. Continued...



DOUBTFUL: RMIT Islamic group claims its women members are being sexually abused while praying on campus

March 14, 2009 Providing prayer rooms and similar facilities to mainstreams religions seems a perfectly reasonable thing for higher education institutions to do.

But those advocating for them ought beware of flicking the switch to hysterical in making their case.

The jihadist’s favourite daily newspaper in Melbourne, The Age faithfully reports an RMIT Muslim activist making a very big and unsubstantiated claim:

Some women had been sexually abused and harassed while praying, Mr Elrafihi said.

Unless Sheik Hilaly is in town, that does seem rather unlikely.

There are plenty of enthusiasts for causes inclined
to gild the lily and it seems Mr Elrafihi of the RMIT Islamic Society is no exception.

Repeating that hysterical and patently absurd claim without any attempt to obtain proof of it is highly irresponsible behaviour. It’s amazing to think some - not all - look down their nose at tabloid newspapers and say their standards are lower than The Age. If that was ever true, it is certainly no longer.

Certainly if it was true it seems highly unlikely this sexually abused and harassed minority would be gathered:
prostrated under posters proclaiming “Virgins wanted” while students and workmen bustled around them.

Unless it was a reference to subscribers to the Virgin mobile phone network, you’d like to think that the RMIT Islamic Society that draws on funding at least in part from taxpayers would not be discriminating against non-virgins or anyone else nor needlessly making reference to sex in a totally inappropriate context.

So hopefully the leaders of this group will ge
t their prayer room and they can reflect on their religion’s mandate not to lie and to treat all equally. It sounds like they’ll have plenty to pray about.