TVA Nouvelles

The TVA report on Tuesday claimed that an electrical company doing work near two mosques had signed a contract — at the mosques' insistence — that kept female construction workers away during Friday prayers.

The news segment featured several interviews with people expressing outrage at the agreement, including an opposition politician who called it "unacceptable that religion is used as a pretext to violate the equality between men and women."

The Ahl-ill Bait mosque, however, says there was never any such deal.

William Korbatly, the mosque's lawyer, told BuzzFeed Canada that the only contract the mosque signed was with the City of Montreal to allow the construction work on part of their property, and that nothing in there stipulated gender-based discrimination. He also said the TVA reporter, Marie-Pier Cloutier, made no attempt to speak with the mosque leadership before the initial report.

"They were not contacted prior to the release of the TVA news," Korbatly said.

He said any contract with a gender-based clause would be illegal, and not something the mosque would endorse.

"It just doesn't add up. It's completely false," he said.