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Ottawa – Canadian Employment and Social Development Minister Jason Kenney on Friday took to Twitter and promoted his controversial policies as Immigration Minister, when he had directed Muslim women from wearing niqabs while taking their oath of citizenship.
“I believe people taking the public oath of citizenship should do so publicly, with their faces uncovered”, he tweeted.
Kenney then proceeded to ask his 35,700 followers on their stance on the issue. He is currently facing a lawsuit over the ban– Zunera Ishaq, a Pakistani immigrant living in Mississauga, is the plaintiff in the lawsuit. She argues that the ban violates her Charter riots by not accommodating her religious beliefs.
At a Federal court in Toronto on Thursday, one of Ishaq’s lawyers accused Kenney of imposing his own ideology on citizenship ceremonies by imposing the ban unilaterally in 2011. Kenney had, at the time, said that the niqab represented an unacceptable view of women in Canada.
The defense had argued that the process of becoming a citizen is not a right, but is a privilege, and said that she had removed the niqab when she got her driver’s license.
Lorne Waldman, one of Ishaq’s lawyers, scoffed at the defense, and pointed out that the Citizenship Act did not require anyone to be heard or seen taking the oath.
“Jason Kenney can believe in anything he wants as a private citizen”, Waldman said on Friday.
“But the minister is confusing his personal beliefs with his obligations as a minister of the Crown. As a minister of the Crown, he has to uphold the laws, and not only was the policy change he made unauthorized, it’s inconsistent with existing laws and with the Charter”, he said.
Waldman added that it was “unusual” for Kenney to weigh in on the matter before the courts did.
“One would expect at this point for the minister to wait for the court process to unfold”, he said.