Can’t fight unfair complaint: B’nai Brith ( brought to the HRC by Moslems)
The Jewish community’s human rights organization says it is being unfairly targeted in a discrimination complaint that it can’t possibly defend.
Legal counsel for B’nai Brith Canada said the organization has been dogged by a four-year-old complaint to the Manitoba Human Rights Commission where specifics of the alleged wrongdoing have not been spelled out and the complainant never witnessed the alleged incident.
“We’re involved in shadow boxing,” lawyer David Matas Thursday of B’nai Brith’s attempts to defend a complaint of discrimination. “It’s been 4 1/2 years and we don’t understand why this (complaint) hasn’t been dismissed as frivolous.”
In February of 2004, prominent Muslim advocate Shahina Siddiqui filed a complaint against B’nai Brith for hosting a counterterrorism workshop for police, firefighters and paramedics she said was biased against Muslims.
The workshop had been held the previous October and was given by an internationally renowned firm with expertise in counterterrorism.
Siddiqui admitted she never attended the workshop but filed the complaint after hearing comments from those she said had attended.
Matas said the commission should have automatically dismissed the complaint, adding he doesn’t understand why the commission still hasn’t made a decision on whether to recommend a hearing be held.
Matas said the commission staff have told him that they’ve interviewed the individuals Siddiqui said passed the comments to her but the commission refused to disclose the identity of those individuals or what it is they’ve allegedly told the commission.
Matas said the commission has recently told the B’nai Brith it’s turning over its file to an outside expert to determine if a hearing should be held on the complaint, adding that the commission refuses to identify the expert or provide B’nai Brith with a copy of the file.
Siddiqui could not be reached for comment and the executive of the Manitoba Human Rights Commission did not return calls to the Free Press.