France: Towards Banning Niqab and Burqa

As a European Muslim, what do you feel about this new proposed bill against wearing Burqa in France?

The story goes back to July 22, 2008, when the first bill for the same purpose was issued by Françoise Hostalier, MP for the leading centre-Right UMP. She asked for imposing a ban on niqab and burqa in France. But Madame Hostalier received little success from other parties and her project got no real media coverage. Her bill was then forgotten and soon replaced by a new one presented by Jacques Myard in September 2008. Mr. Myard, who is also a member of UMP Party, proposed to penalize women wearing niqab or Burqa in public; and if necessary to take them to court exactly like criminals. His project remained without suite.

The current row over burqa and niqab is then the third incident of the burqa-ban series. It arrives in June, few days before the summer holidays began, and this time the bill receives more echo. Gérin succeeded to avoid the usual procedure required for bills related to important social questions. He chose a canny faster way by proposing a parliamentary probe into what he describes as the rising number of Muslims who wear the loose outfit that covers the body from head to toe in France. The other deputies who have joined his request are from various political groups, but, the majority of them are the same ones who were in the front line of the ban on the hijab in public schools.

"A Marginal Issue"
 
Gérin registered his bill on June 9. It was published ten days later, and since then it has been receiving clear national and international media coverage on a daily basis. According to the bill, the commission shall come up with its report before the end of November, 2009. 

Scanning the French newspapers, one can easily recognize that the majority of the political leaders approve the idea of forming an investigatory commission. Politicians, who are known for their hostility to Islam and Muslims, are very active in the media interviews. On the other hand, neutral French leaders tackle the question with very little interest. Among the 577 French MPs, none is known as a Muslim. And a few of them understand that niqab and burqa are just easy pretexts for expressing Islamophobic ideas.

During the last few days, leader of the French Muslim community discussed a strategy to oppose Gerin's project. The petition they launched on the Internet has collected more than 1200 signatures in 24 hours. However, they, still, have very little chances to reach their goal in collecting a great number of signatures that can support their stance against the bill.

A diminutive number of French Muslims are directly concerned with this row stirred over niqab and burqa in France. Most of those who adopt this dress stand far from network of the French the civil/Islamic organizations. Thus, they are easy targets for the media. French Muslims themselves are often reticent about burqa and niqab issue and Islam's ruling on them. In private, many Muslims criticize women wearing burqa but very few openly condemn them.

Because they are stigmatized in their media everyday, French Muslims are worried about their image. In 2003, during a protest demonstration against the ban of the hijab, a female demonstrator wearing burqa was attacked by the other demonstrators until she left the demonstration.

French Islam-Eradicators

Suspicions and prejudices on Islam and Muslims are already grave in the French public opinion and media. The secular fundamentalists are always looking out for any visible Islamic expression in France to work on vanishing it. They are the "eradicators" of Islam who are always pleading for Muslim males without beard, Muslim females without veil, and Mosques without minarets.

In his book La nouvelle islamophobie, The New Islamophobia, sociologist Vincent Geisser shows how some French Islam-eradicators can also be Muslims. Geisser calls them "Muslim islamophobics."  But in general, for the French Muslims as well as for the national media, niqab and burqa refer either to a "retrograde" interpretation of Islam or to radical ideological movements which many want to keep distance from.

What Is Behind Gérin's Bill?

Gérin says niqab and burqa are not garments but "women's prisons." And as a democrat, the French MP, "wants to set those women free and have no such prisons in France!" For him burqa and Niqab are “female degrading dresses that also refer to their blind obedience to their husbands, and to the other male members of her family, while her citizenship-related conditions are being negated by all." M. Gérin illustrates his convictions by quoting three cases as "jurisprudences."

In his proposal, he mentioned the case of Imam Bouziane who was expelled from France in April 2004 after giving an interview saying "according to the Qur’an, a husband has the right to beat his wife." Gerin also pointed out to a case where a French nationality request was submitted by a Muslim woman and rejected by the judge due to the fact that she was wearing a niqab. The controversial bill ended up by quoting the case of another lady who wanted to learn French and was refused to enter the adult course because of her niqab.
 
"These jurisprudences are useful but are not enough to face these practices which we cannot tolerate in France,” writes M. Gérin, calling for the National Assembly to seize the folder and create an Inquiry commission.

In 2003, a commission was established for a similar purpose, entitled Stasi Commission. Stasi's target was to study a proposal submitted in the Parliament for banning the hijab in public schools. According to Alain Gresh, a famous French journalist and intellectual, "The Stasi commission was far from a projection in the better understanding we need for secularity. This commission was just a tool to prepare public opinion to accept the law."

A Threat to French Secularity!?

This sort of virulent discourse, "in defence of secularity and the Republic", is the classic demagogic discourse that French politicians are always certain to deliver when they attack Islam. Philippe Val used the same phrase when he decided to republish the Danish cartoons of the Prophet in his weekly, Charlie Hebdo. At the end of the day, Mr. Val became the director of France-inter radio station.

Fadela Amara is very good at the same type of discourse; "in defence of secularism, the Republic and freedom of women." From president of the feminist “Ni putes ni soumise” association she became the Urban Affairs Minister appointed by Mr. Sarkozy after she had opposed Islam and Muslims in many incidents. In the current polemic, she is a fierce supporter of André Gérin. "The niqab is a coffin that kills women's fundamental freedoms," according to Mamra. Being the Urban Affairs Minister, she is directly concerned with this polemic.

Ni Putes, ni Soumises

With no surprise, "Ni putes ni soumises" has adopted the same anti-Islam position.  For the feminist organization, a law to ban burqa and niqab is a steady necessity after the law of banning headscarf in public schools. When Barack Obama invited Western countries to let their Muslim citizens choose freely what to wear, 'Ni putes ni soumisses" accused M. Obama of being “enemy of women’s freedom"
 
For Eric Besson, UMP member and Minister of Immigration and National Identity, a law is not the best way to fight against niqab and to defend the Republic. He finds it "inappropriate to reopen the debate" on the veil because it endangers the balance found in the law approved in 2004. Like some feminists, Mr. Besson thinks that if Muslim women are informed and educated, they will take off their niqab and burqa on their own.

Burqa, "Unwelcome in France"

Mohamed Moussaoui, President of the French Council of the Muslim Cult (CFCM), told IOL that he is “shocked” by André Gérin's bill. Moussaoui declared that André Gérin "doesn't understand what is behind the row over niqab, a very marginal problem, especially at a moment when more than thousands of people are suffering from the consequences of the financial crisis all over the country." He believes that it would be more beneficial for French citizens if the MPs asked for a commission to find solutions to the hundreds of thousands of people who have lost their jobs because of the crisis.

"By raising such a debate in such conditions, they will only stigmatize Islam and the Muslim in France”, he added.

On Monday June 22, 2009, during an important awaited speech, President Sarkozy backed the idea of a Parliamentary commission. Sustaining the position of the feminists, Mr. Sarkozy declared that "the niqab is not a religious garment. It's not a matter of Islam. It's a matter of liberty and dignity of women." Affirming that burqa and niqab deprived women from social relations, M. Sarkosy declared that "for these reasons, burqa is not welcomed on the soil of the Republic."

In 2003, when the law of banning hijab was a political argument against the French President Jacques Chirac, Nicolas Sarkozy, who was the Minister of Interior and was looking forward to presidency, opposed to Jacques Chirac's approval and expressed his disagreement with the law. That time, a law for banning niqab and burqa is in favour of M. Sarkozy as "a protector of the Republic."

The French Neo-Con

The United group against Islamophobia in France (CCIF) is the main national body which fight Islamophobia in France. In his last annual report, CCIF data showed that French Islamophobia was coming from the top of the institutions. For Samy Debbah, spokesman of CCIF, "this new burqa-dispute corroborates our data. In this country, the state's institutions are the ones which impulse Islamophobia in the system. They initiate it not only by voting new laws but through the administration services as well."

For the CCIF leader there is a bastion of "neo-conservators" among French political leaders. He thinks that "their current attitude is just a response to the Barack Obama's speech in Cairo. With this useless debate, our national "neo-cons" are sending a message to Obama saying, you have overcome your neo-cons in the USA, but we are still strong here in France."

M. Debbah noticed that the biggest fans of Gérin's bill were the ones who voted for the law of banning hijab in public schools in 2004, and who wanted France to joint the US in its war against Iraq.

Fouziha Zebdi-Ghorab was the first wearing-hijab French candidate to the elections.  Commenting on the Burqa debate, Ghorab told IOL that the Gérin bill is “Banning hijab was a new phase in a process that started in 2004. Jacques Myard and Françoise Hostalier had already failed to reach their similar goal. But this time, with André Gérin's bill, they have a great opportunity to fulfil their ambitions.”

As a European Muslim, what do you feel about this new proposed bill against wearing Burqa in France? Do you think that this proposed law has an opportunity to pass? Will this debate over Burqa affect the image of Islam and Muslims in Europe negatively? What is the role that a European Muslim can play to face such an anti-Islam situation?

* A petition against the anti-burka new law was launched by French Muslims and can be found in this link:http://jesigne.fr/contreunenouvelleloiislamophobe

Amara Bamba is the editor-in-chief of www.saphirnews.com, the first French web daily  magazine focusing on Islamic information. He studied Mathematics and communications with a project to create a French media dedicated to Islamic news and information. You may contact him via Euro_Muslims@iolteam.com.