A twenty-three-year-old widow in Akyem Tafo in the Eastern region is to be given 100 lashes in public for defying a major Islamic principle on widowhood rites, which is known as Iddah.
Ramatu Alhassan is facing the wrath of Muslim clerics in her community for getting pregnant while observing Iddah.
The Iddah rites requires that a widow abstains from sex. However, Ramatu was found pregnant two months into the widowhood rites.
Accra based radio station, Starr FM reported that the clerics in the community have been angered by the development and intend subjecting Ramatu and her boyfriend to public flogging as punishment.
Deputy Chief Imam at Akyem Tafo, Mallam Madhi Ahmed told the radio station that the punishment must be applied to the lady and her boyfriend in line with Islamic principles and teachings.
“The law says that if something of this nature happens, both of them, if they are not married, they have to be caned 100 lashes each. But if they are married, then, they have to be executed.”
“So in this case, I can say the boy, he is not married but the girl is still in the room of her husband [late] so the law has to take effect on her.”
“If it’s other country like Saudi Arabia, she should be executed and the boy too given 100 lashes. And this happened too in that same room on the same bed [late husband's room], so we have to apply that law on her,” Mallam Ahmed said.
Ramatu’s in-laws are said to have supported the punishment to be meted out to her, according to Starr FM.
Human rights activists in the town are said to have condemned the action of the Muslim clerics.
Source: Graphic Online
