Azalina says Muslim sportswomen need not cover up

Wednesday, 11 July 2007, 08:47pm
©The Sun

PUTRAJAYA (July 11, 2007): Malaysia's Youth and Sports
Minster, a Muslim woman with a martial-arts
black-belt, likes to lead by example: she does not
wear a headscarf and insists that Muslim sportswomen
do not have to cover up either.

Datuk Azalina Othman Said, 43, believes women offer
the best chance of glory for a modern Muslim nation
hungry for sporting success - but in trying to
encourage more girls to take up sports, she is quietly
holding the line against conservative Islam.

Wearing a tracksuit-top and pants, Azalina told
Reuters in an interview in her office yesterday that
Muslim sportswomen were free here to dress just like
their non-Muslim rivals, whether in the pool, on the
diving board or in the gymnastics arena.

"It's never become an issue in Malaysia," she said,
declaring that women of all ages should, and do, feel
free in this country to "wear shorts and jump around".

"I mean we have Muslim gymnasts wearing tights and
it's never crossed anyone's mind about how athletes
are dressed. I am quite thankful that the people of
Malaysia are still open-minded."

But in reality not all Malaysians are so open minded.

In February, the Islamist government of the northeast
state of Kelantan barred men from watching or
officiating at a women's national sports competition -
and even in the absence of men, many athletes chose to
compete wearing headscarves.

Malaysia prides itself on being a moderate Muslim
country and its national government presents itself as
a bulwark against Islamic extremists, but Malaysian
society is widely seen to be bending to the global
forces of conservative Islam.

In a country where 20 years ago women tended not to
wear headscarves, religious police now prowl
nightclubs and have detained women for immodest dress.
This month, they hauled a singer away from a club for
exposing too much of her back.

Religious authorities have so far stayed outside the
sporting arena, and Azalina remains confident that it
will stay that way.

But she warns that this cannot be guaranteed if there
is a change to Malaysia's formula of multi-racial
coalition government, where the Muslim majority share
power with non-Muslim parties representing ethnic
Chinese and ethnic Indians.

"The day they change the government, I doubt it," she
said, shaking her head.

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