Egyptians abuzz over PM's breast talk
2013-02-08 10:15
Cairo - Egypt's prime minister faced uproar, derision and
even lawsuits on Thursday after he blamed health problems of babies in
impoverished villages on nursing mothers who "out of ignorance" don't
clean their breasts and talked of village women getting raped in the fields.
Hesham Kandil made the remarks as he tried to make a point
about poverty at a press conference aired live on TV this week. The backlash
put the previously little known technocrat appointed by Islamist President
Mohammed Morsi under a spotlight.
Rights advocates and activists said on Thursday it showed a
prime minister who is out of his depth — and who holds elitist and patriarchal
attitudes that blame poor women for everything from not bringing their children
up right to bringing dishonour on society.
A number of lawyers in Beni Sweif, a province Kandil
mentioned specifically, filed lawsuits against him, accusing him of libel, an
official at the top prosecutor's office said, speaking on condition of anonymity
because they weren't authorised to talk to the press.
Kandil was responding to a question about whether economic
policies are increasing poverty in Egypt and how poverty contributed to the
wave of unrest since late January.
With a muddled and stumbling response, Kandil seemed to be
trying to show he was aware of the depth of poverty in Egypt. "I've been
around," he insisted.
"In the 21st century, there are still villages in Egypt
where babies are infected with diarrhea ... because their mothers nursing them,
out of their ignorance, don't do the personal hygiene of cleaning their
breasts," Kandil he said.
He spoke of visiting villages in Beni Sweif, just south of
Cairo, in 2004, saying, "There is no running water or sewage".
"Extreme shallow vision"
"Men go to the mosque... Women go to the field and get
raped," he said, apparently meaning men wash at the mosque while women go
to the river to wash. "This is happening in Egypt."
"Egypt is full of miseries," he said. "The
solution is not in violence."
Many were baffled over what point he was trying to make
exactly. But critics said his comments reflected the conservative mindset of
his Islamist backers — the Muslim Brotherhood, from which Morsi hails, or their
ultraconservative allies.
"His talk reflects extreme shallow vision and ignorance
of everything related to the Egyptian community and all the problems that the
Egyptian women are suffering," said Nehad Aboul-Qomsan, head of the
Egyptian Centre for Women rights, a vocal critic of the Islamists.
She saw his rape comment as implying the women were to blame
for going out, while men go to mosques. "His words are ... no more than
what he hears from the cleric whose hand he kisses after the sermon," she
said.
The Brotherhood's political party, Freedom and Justice,
distanced itself from Kandeel's remarks, calling them
"inappropriate."
"If the prime minister had noticed, he would have
apologized," party spokesman Murad Ali said. "We know he is a decent
man."
But Egyptian feminist and writer Karima Kamal said Kandil's
remarks match the Brotherhood's attitudes toward women.
"Women's role in the Muslim Brotherhood is limited to
helping men capture seats of power. They use them in elections very well. Then
they keep them on the margins. There is nothing called equality between men and
women," she said.
Political debate
Islamist rule has raised fears of limits of women's rights,
especially after Islamists pushed through a constitution that provides few
protections. There were only four women among the 85 members of the Constituent
Assembly that passed the final draft later approved in a referendum in
December.
Prejudices against women were also reflected in latest
political debate on a women's quota in parliament.
Islamist lawmakers, particularly ultraconservative Salafis
who push for segregation of the sexes and the covering of women, managed to
change an article in the new parliamentary election law that would have brought
more women into parliament by obliging parties to put female candidates at the
top of their electoral lists.
As for Kandil, "I see a man with no qualifications
whatsoever to become a prime minister", Kamal said.
The 50-year-old Kandil, a religious conservative, was a
little known expert on water resources when he was named prime minister by
Morsi in July. Since then, he's come under attack several times. Once, he was
forced to flee from a mosque without his shoes to get away from angry mourners
during the funeral of 16 soldiers killed by militants near the Gaza border.
Last week, anti-Morsi protesters drove him out of Cairo's Tahrir Square,
throwing chunks of concrete at him.
He was widely mocked during the summer when he called on
Egyptians to wear cotton clothes and sit in one room to cut down on air
conditioner use during power shortages.
Kandil's remarks sparked a flood of jokes, cartoons and
comments on social networking sites and TV talk shows.
"I feel sorry for him," a well-known political
blogger Zeinobia wrote of Kandil, "because he is appointed in [a] position
that is bigger than his own political as well as social capabilities."
- AP
