The debate over the wearing of abayas in France's schools took a two-hour detour to the Conseil d'Etat, France's highest administrative court, in Paris on Tuesday, September 5. Two hours passed with tense, passionate, and sometimes messy discussions before the court. An appeal was filed by the lawyers William Bourdon and Vincent Brengarth acting on behalf of the Action Droits des Musulmans (Action Rights of Muslims, ADM) organization, formed in 2015 to fight against measures deemed Islamophobic. It called for the suspension of the Ministry of Education's memorandum banning the wearing of abayas and khamis in schools.

A total of five Ministry of Education representatives were present for the defense. However, only Guillaume Odinet, director of legal affairs, spoke on behalf of the government. Aside from Sihem Zine, the founder of ADM, and a judge, who did not speak but assisted the summary proceedings hearing president, this judicial debate on clothing worn by young Muslim women was only attended by men.

Two things must be demonstrated for an appeal to be accepted: The urgency to act due to prejudice and a serious and manifestly illegal infringement of fundamental rights. Both parties vigorously debated these points under the watchful eye of Pierre Collin, who often attempted to put the discussions back on track. The Jeunesse France Harcèlement, an organization dedicated to fighting harassment and cyberbullying, which had sought to join the appeal prior to the debates, had their submission ruled inadmissible due to a lack of legal interest.

In his argument, Brengarth focused on the fact that the government had made a major policy change by banning the abaya entirely from schools the day before the start of the new school year. It was a change from the last school year when the ban was left to the discretion of the heads of each school. There's therefore an urgent need to rule on the matter in order to avoid the exclusion of dozens, if not hundreds, of students. During his response to the defense brief, the lawyer cited several cases of young girls who were banned from class on the first day of the school year, as reported by the ADM association on Monday evening.

As far as the Ministry of Education is concerned, the August 31 memorandum, accompanied by a letter explaining its content and approach to parents, is nothing more than a revision to a 2004 law prohibiting ostentatious religious symbols in schools, including symbols such as the hijab, yarmulke and disproportionately sized crosses. The defense believes that there is no new issue to debate and that the memorandum simply clarifies the application of existing law in response to a request from the heads of schools. As a result of the phenomenal rise of the wearing of the abaya as a Muslim and community marker in schools, Odinet said his ministry's monthly survey indicates an explosion of violations of secularism. The national education lawyer cites a previous decree by the Conseil d'État prohibiting the wearing of permanent bandanas in place of headscarves as support for his argument.

You have 49.13% of this article left to read. The rest is for subscribers only.