Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2008. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Sunday Times (Johannesburg) - July 26, 2008
Prega Govender
Muslim brides and their future husbands could soon be forced to take Aids tests - and reveal the results to their clerics - before being allowed to marry.
A Democratic Alliance member of parliament, Rafeek Shah, who is also an Islamic scholar and moulana (religious leader), called this week for a fatwa (Islamic ruling) making it compulsory for Muslim couples to undergo Aids tests before their weddings.
On Wednesday, Shah wrote to the United Ulama Council of South Africa (UUCSA) and asked it to "seriously consider" passing the fatwa.
The UUCSA - a coalition of seven major Islamic groupings - said it would table Shah's call at its national executive meeting next month.
If the fatwa is passed, it would give the more than 450 imams or leaders of mosques the power to refuse to marry couples who don't take the test.
Shah said in his letter that his aim was not to prevent HIV-positive Muslims from marrying, but to help them undergo premarital counselling and to protect their future spouses.
But Shah is also calling for couples to present their imams with an "Aids certificate" disclosing their status.
"I know there are constitutional problems with this (call). But I believe the collective welfare of society should take precedence over individual rights," Shah said.
In his letter to the UUCSA, Shah wrote: "HIV/Aids poses a serious threat not only to the Muslim community but to South African society as a whole and it is our responsibility as religious leaders to respond."
Shah said moulanas would continue to perform marriages where either or both partners were HIV-positive.
"Forcing them to take an Aids test would help them decide whether they still wanted to marry after getting to know the other's status," Shah said.
Shah's call has been endorsed by other leading Muslim clerics, who say it is founded in Islamic law.
Durban imam Hafez Fuzail Soofie said that once prospective couples knew their HIV status, "then it becomes morally binding on them from an Islamic perspective to inform their partner".
Rafeek Hassen, director of the Islamic Interfaith Research Institute, said Shah's call would not be opposed - even by conservative Muslims.
"Aids is a reality. In Islam, when it comes to marriage, there has to be disclosure of certain key things. Why not disclosure of one's HIV status?"
Professor Suleman Dangor of the University of KwaZulu-Natal's school of religion and theology said Shah's call was "warranted" because many people had premarital sex.
Moulana Ihsaan Hendricks, president of the Cape-based Muslim Judicial Council , one of the UUCSA's affiliates, said that although Shah's suggestion conformed to Islamic law, getting jurists to pass a fatwa was a different question.
Another UUCSA affiliate, the Jamiatul-Ulama of KwaZulu-Natal, rejected Shah's proposed fatwa, saying it infringed the rights of those leading "pure and chaste lives".
"The Jamiat urges those seeking marital partners to follow the Prophet's advice of seeking a partner who has piety," it said in a statement.
Yusuf Patel, UUCSA's secretary-general, said there was nothing wrong with Shah's call.
KwaZulu-Natal bride-to-be Shamshaad Trimm, 20, who is getting married next month, said she and her future husband would take an HIV test.
"It's good to know if your partner is infected. If he or she is HIV-positive, one can decide whether or not to go ahead with the marriage," said Trimm, who met her fiance two months ago.
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