Rad­hi­ca Sookraj

Mus­lims in cen­tral Trinidad say they are be­ing brand­ed as ter­ror­ists af­ter re­ports sur­faced that an Is­lam­ic or­gan­i­sa­tion in the area is linked to an al­leged as­sas­si­na­tion plot in­volv­ing Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and oth­er Cab­i­net Min­is­ters.At the Masjid-ul-Mut­taqeen mosque, Munroe Road, Cunu­pia, Maulana Sher­az Ali said more than 15 Mus­lim or­gan­i­sa­tions were di­rect­ly af­fect­ed by the re­port.

"Since 9/11 the Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ty has faced a lot of pres­sure and now we have be­come im­mune to the stig­ma," Ali said. Say­ing he was not dis­put­ing the va­lid­i­ty of the as­sas­si­na­tion plot, Ali ex­plained: "I re­al­ly feel the au­thor­i­ties could have nar­rowed it down a lit­tle more."They leave every­body, who is Mus­lim, open for all kinds of sus­pi­cion. They should have been more pre­cise in­stead of la­belling every­body. There are so much Mus­lim groups in Cen­tral who are af­fect­ed by this."

Ali added that while fill­ing fu­el at a ser­vice sta­tion yes­ter­day, the pump at­ten­dant told him that Mus­lims were be­ing treat­ed un­fair­ly.He added: "Every­body is look­ing at us as crim­i­nals but we have noth­ing to do with the threat on the Prime Min­is­ter. I am sure they would not have treat­ed oth­er re­li­gious groups like that." Mean­while, head of the Mon­trose Mus­lim As­so­ci­a­tion, Imam Hamza Mo­ham­mad, said he too ex­pe­ri­enced stereo­typ­ing yes­ter­day. He said: "This will leave peo­ple to won­der if we are in­volved. Mus­lims will be­come tar­gets now and fin­gers will be point­ed at us. It is a bad im­age for Mus­lims.

"While dri­ving through the streets peo­ple were say­ing 'all you want to as­sas­si­nate the Prime Min­is­ter, boy.' It re­al­ly is un­for­tu­nate."Mo­ham­mad al­so said he be­lieved the plot was a hoax, geared at con­tin­u­ing the state of emer­gency.The imam added he al­ready had bought goods for a night- time flea mar­ket for Christ­mas and if the state of emer­gency con­tin­ued, then his busi­ness would be af­fect­ed.

Oth­er ma­jor Mus­lim or­gan­i­sa­tions op­er­at­ing in cen­tral Trinidad are the AS­JA Masjid, Long­denville Mus­lim Group, En­ter­prise Com­mu­ni­ty Ma­jid, War­renville Ja­ma Mosque, Tab­ligh Ja­mad, Kel­ly Vil­lage Is­lam­ic Cen­tre, the Is­lam­ic Mis­sion­saries Guild, St He­le­na, and the Darul Uloom.