France will ban children in state-run schools from wearing loose-fitting, full-length robes known as abayas, worn by some Muslim women. This is the first major announcement from new education minister Gabriel Attal, who spoke to French media on Sunday ahead of the back-to-school season.
"I have decided that the abaya could no longer be worn in schools," Education Minister Gabriel Attal said in an interview with television channel TF1 on Sunday.
"When you walk into a classroom, you shouldn't be able to identify the pupils' religion just by looking at them," he said.
According to him, the garment violated France's strict secular laws in education.
Attal added he would give "clear rules at the national level" to school heads ahead of the return to classes nationwide from 4 September.
The announcement is the first major move by Attal, 34, since he was promoted this summer to handle the hugely contentious education portfolio.
France's Education Minister, Gabriel Attal, announced that the country will prohibit the wearing of abayas in schools, citing concerns about these garments being seen as a religious expression that goes against France's secular laws.
— Brandsynario (@brandsynario) August 28, 2023
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.#Brandsynario #France #Muslims #Students pic.twitter.com/Z2KKkNiZQ9
Months of debate
The move comes after months of debate over the wearing of abayas in French schools, where women and even young girls have been banned from wearing the Islamic headscarf since 2011.
The right and far-right had pushed for the ban, which the left argued would encroach on civil liberties.
There have been reports of abayas being increasingly worn in schools and tensions within school over the issue between teachers and parents.
But for the girls wearing them, the abayas are cultural clothes, not religious ones.
Abayas are especially widespread in countries of the Maghreb and the Gulf.
The national body encompassing Muslim associations, le Conseil français du culte musulman (CFCM), has said items of clothing alone are not "a religious sign".
Cultural symbol
It is not a garment directly linked to the Muslim faith, but "to a culture", according to Anne-Laure Zwilling, anthropologist of religions at the CNRS, as she explained in an interview with France Info. "If the abaya were a religious garment, all Muslim women should wear it."
No text evokes it directly, and it is not present in the whole of the Muslim world.
It doesn't cover the face or the hair, and can be colourful.
The far-right applauded the move.
Of the left-wing opposition France Unbowed party (France Insoumise), Clementine Autain denounced what she described as the "policing of clothing".
Attal's announcement was "unconstitutional" and against the founding principles of France's secular values, she argued – and symptomatic of the government's "obsessive rejection of Muslims".
Earlier this year, on the same debate, Attal's predecessor as education minister Pap Ndiaye had said that he did not want "to publish endless catalogues to specify the lengths of dresses".
Struggle to provide guidelines
France enforced a strict ban on religious signs in state schools as early as in 19th century.
The laws were design to remove the traditional and dominant Catholic influence from public education.
French governments have however have struggled to update guidelines to deal with minorities.
A law of March 2004 banned "the wearing of signs or outfits by which students ostensibly show a religious affiliation" in schools. This includes large crosses, Jewish kippas and Islamic headscarves.
And in 2010 a ban on full face veils in public was enforced, angering some in France's five million-strong Muslim community.
More recently, in June, the football federation renewed a ban on players wearing the Islamic veil during matchs, despite complaints.
(with newswires)
