How's this for a candidate???

At least she blogs!

A muslim woman running for public office in the Netherlands has refused to be interviewed or photographed and will only campaign in mosques, sparking new claims of attempts of isolationism among the Islamic community.

Ouafaa Abrazi is standing for the Islam Democraten in municipal elections in the Zuid-Holland region, and is the only female candidate on the Islamic list.

"She does not want to give interviews and we must also not give her phone number to anyone," said Islam Democrat leader Hasan Kucuk.
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"She does not want to appear in public and certainly not have her photo in the paper."

Miss Abrazi, a prominent campaigner against government plans to ban the wearing of the burqa in public, will instead restrict her campaign to a Muslim-only audience, concentrating her efforts in local mosques.

She has, however, embraced the internet, and regularly blogs.

"We Muslims must know that it is our duty to take decisions which benefit the Islamic nation, choosing the Islam Democrats is one of them," she writes on Maroc.nl.

Ronald Sorensen, the leader of Leefbaar Rotterdam, a city council grouping founded by the assassinated Dutch populist politician Pim Fortuyn, welcomed Miss Abrazi's candidature as an opportunity to address "ideas from the middle ages".

"This is the first time Muslims have been so honest. We know that over half of them act like that, if only Muslims had been this open before," he said.

"We like to fight Muslim separatism in the public arena, before Dutch Islamic political parties there was no chance to debate these things publicly."

Miss Abrazi teaches in the Muslim Yunus Emre primary school in The Hague. Abdelsadek Maas, the school's chairman, is another Islamic candidate. Pupils at the school mark Islamic religious days and observe mid-day prayer.