According to the site, the petition was Monday evening drawn almost 60,000 times. If all of those are valid signatures, it is well above the 40,000 mark, with which, in theory, a debate in the House of Representatives can at least be enforced.
The petition is an initiative of Imam Ismail Abou Soumayyah of the Quba mosque in The Hague, which is known as a Salafist. “We Muslims strongly condemn all forms of violence as a result of the cartoons,” reads the first sentence. ‘Having said this, we Muslims also believe that insulting our Prophet Muhammad has nothing to do with freedom of speech. Rather, it is a lack of decency and also leads to social tensions as well as structural insult to Muslims. We therefore call on the government to make insulting the prophet (even all prophets) a criminal offense. ‘
Yassin Elforkani
The petition is in line with a proposal that Yassin Elforkani, the imam of the Blue Mosque in Amsterdam, Friday did to restrict freedom of expression.
A citizens’ initiative cannot be about the Constitution. According to professor of constitutional law Wim Voermans, this is not the case in this case. “I don’t agree with it myself, but I think this initiative is possible. You are essentially asking for a law by which you want to restrict a constitutional right. ” So it is not a matter of revising the Constitution, says Voermans.
But the political scientist Menno Hurenkamp, who has researched citizens’ initiatives at the University of Amsterdam, considers it virtually impossible that the House of Representatives is prepared to have a debate on the reintroduction of blasphemy. “These kinds of initiatives very often fail because of a lack of political will. Even though there will be 200,000 signatures, I consider the chance that the House of Representatives will agree to this in the run-up to the parliamentary elections almost zero.
–
