13 January 2005

AMSTERDAM — Preparations are underway to establish a new political party to represent Muslims in the Netherlands, it was reported on Thursday.

A group of Muslims in Amsterdam plan to launch the Muslim Democratic Party (MDP) in May and contest local elections in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague and Utrecht, according to their spokesman Mohammed Jabri.

He told news agency ANP that the group was also looking at contesting the local election in a city in the province of North Brabant where a large number of Muslims live.

Depending on how well the party grows, Jabri said it might contest the next general election. But he also said the party was having some difficulty in attracting people with the expertise to lead the party.

The establishment of the MDP comes after the controversial Arab European League (AEL) was founded, originally in Antwerp, Belgium, by Dyab Abou Jahjah to fight what he said was discrimination against Muslims and Arabs. It now has a branch in the Netherlands and has forged a link with the MDP.

But the MDP also wants to remain independent and is in discussions with well-known and less-well known Muslims to get the party off the ground in the big cities. Contact was also being sought with non-Muslims, Jabri said, "in order to get a balance within the party's management".

The announcement of the new party comes days after former Immigration and Integration Minister Hilbrand Nawijn said Muslims should assimilate rather than integrate into Dutch society.

He said that Muslim schools should be banned in the Netherlands, even though the Constitution enshrines the right to establish religious schools. His remarks were not met by a public outcry.

Following the murder of filmmaker Theo van Gogh in Amsterdam last November, there were a spate of tit-for-tat attacks against Muslim and Christian buildings. A Muslim school in Uden was burnt down and another Muslim school in Eindhoven was bombed.

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