Sydney, June 24 (ANI): The wife of the president of an Islamic representative body in Australia, has said that polygamy is fine and acceptable as long as it is done in the right way.
Mrs Keysar Trad, the wife of Keysar Trad, president of the Islamic Friendship Association of Australia, said many people in polygamous marriages kept it a secret - not only because it was illegal, but because society did not accept it.
“Tell you the truth, the hardest part of it (is) the way the others perceive it not what’s happened between me and him,” she said.
Asked if it was just about wanting sex with more women, the Sydney Morning Herald quoted her as saying: “Yeah it can be, but having it in the right way instead of having it in like go to prostitute or just date”.
Earlier, a key representative of Sydney’s Islamic community said polygamous marriages should be recognised to protect the rights of women.
Sheikh Khalil Chami of the Islamic Welfare Centre in Lakemba today said polygamous marriages, although illegal, existed in Australia and should be recognised.
He told Triple J’s Hack program that: “If you know there is law that will help you, there is community will help you. Why not? Why not change the law?”
The Sydney Morning Herald quoted Sheikh Chami as saying that he was asked almost weekly to conduct polygamous religious ceremonies, but had declined to perform such ceremonies.
He also claimed that there were other sheikhs without any qualifications, without any place, who conducted such marriages.
Islamic Friendship Association of Australia president Keysar Trad said recognising polygamous unions would help protect the rights of women in the relationship.
“This idea of plural sexual relationships, it is not so much frowned upon by society as long as these people don’t say we want a polygamous relationship,” he said. (ANI)