"This is not about religion, it's about lifting constraints on women," said Raffarin

Additional Reporting By Hadi Yahmid, IOL Correspondent

PARIS, November 29 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – As a French school has irreversibly expelled a Muslim girl for refusing to take off her hijab, French Premier Jean-Pierre Raffarin secured Friday, November 28, a majority approval of his ruling party to pass a bill banning the Muslim headscarf in public schools.

He reiterated determination to introduce a bill that would "explicitly ban the ostentatious wearing of any political or religious sign" in public schools – a reference  to hijab - to the parliament, which is dominated by his Union Pour un Movement Populaire (UMP) party.

Getting the approval of 90% of UMP delegates at Friday's meeting near Paris, Raffarin argued the mooted motion was designed to "defend secularism and protect all women from fundamentalist pressures".

"That is the main point. This is not about religion, it's about lifting constraints on women,"  he claimed.

Shortly after the meeting, the office of the prime minister said Raffarin was speaking as head of the parliamentary majority, and that his address did not constitute a "government decision".

In May, Raffarin did not rule out passing a law to ban Muslim girls from wearing hijab to allow secularism restore its strength in the European country.

French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy has long opposed such a law, warning it would provoke a backlash among Muslims, who would view it as an "insult and punishment".

But during Friday's debate he appeared to have given some compromise.

"If we can agree on a bill that in one way or another said: We do not want ostentatious religious signs in state schools, government offices or public hospitals - then I agree," said Sarkozy.

French President Jacques Chirac had set up a commission in July to rule on whether new legislation was needed to handle a growing debate over religion in schools, particularly Muslim schoolgirls wearing hijab.

The commission is expected to submit its report to the president by the end of this year after questioning a number of ministers and representatives of French non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and various syndicates.

Expelled

In a related development, a disciplinary council at Charles-Walch de Thann school, north of France, decided to expel 12-year-old Hilal, of Turkish origin, from school.

It claimed the girl failed to respect the school's in-law by insisting to wear clothes "of ostentatious religious sign on purpose to harass her colleagues, which runs counter to the secular nature of the school".

Hilal was temporarily prevented from attending classes on September 29, just four weeks after the beginning of the school year.

On October 10, she was irreversibly denied access to the school, prompting her mother to get a written statement from the school's administration on the expulsion incident.

Following Friday's decision, Hilal's family filed a lawsuit against the school before Strasbourg Court, north of France.

The preamble of the lawsuit said that the Muslim family had tried in vain to end the row cordially with the school, including the wearing of the bandana as an alternative for the hijab.

In October, Sarkozy suggested replacing the hijab with a bandana, arguing that this could serve as "a middle ground" for the thorny issue of hijab in France.

In September, two Muslim sisters were expelled from Henri Wallon lycee school in the Paris northern suburb of Aubervilliers for wearing hijab.

Separately, an appeal court in the French southern city of Lyon ordered that a Muslim employee to be reinstated to her work after she was "unjustifiably" expelled form a transport company for wearing hijab.