Bill to ban headscarves in sport passed by French Senate

In January 2023, Salimata Sylla was about to lead her team onto the basketball court just as she had done many times before.

On that Sunday morning, she and her teammates had completed a three-hour bus journey from the Paris suburb of Aubervilliers to a rival club based in northern France.

They had changed and warmed up, and Sylla, the team captain, was ready to go. But moments before tipoff, she was told she could not play.

The reason? Her headscarf.

Only then did she learn that the French basketball federation had updated its rules, banning all head coverings as inappropriate for play, contrary to the rules of the international federation.

More than two years later, Sylla is still barred from competing and now organises monthly tournaments in Paris and its suburbs that are open to women playing basketball with their heads bare or wearing a hijab.

“It's easy to have ethical charters, to say that we include everyone, diversity, peaceful coexistence, they're pretty words. But then, this peaceful coexistence shouldn’t mean excluding a group of French women who want to play,” she said.

“So what are they really trying to tell us? They think we’re oppressed because we wear our headscarf? But in the end, they’re also oppressing us because they’ve excluded us from basketball courts,” she said.

Sylla added that everyone knows that “sport is a vehicle for emancipation, especially for girls”.

Until now, sporting federations have been free to decide whether or not to allow headscarves, or ban kits and clothing carrying a religious or political significance.

But now, a contentious bill backed by right-wing politicians, that would ban headscarves in all sporting competitions has cleared its first legislative hurdle in the Senate.

Supporters say the proposed law is a necessary step to protect secularism, a pillar of the French Republic.

Opponents denounce the proposed law as discriminatory, Islamophobic, and a violation of both the rule of law and the very concept of secularism.

Nicolas Cadene, the former secretary-general of the now defunct Observatory for Secularism, a non-partisan institution that previously advised the French government, says the principles of secularism cannot be used to justify the headscarf ban.

“The state, because it is secular, has no business judging a religious symbol,” he said.

“It does not deal with religious symbols, it only prohibits them for those who represent the public administration. This law aims to exclude all these young women

Amnesty International said the bill targets Muslim women and girls by excluding them from sporting competitions if they wear a headscarf or other religious clothing.

Ahead of the 2024 Olympic Games, the human rights organisation published research looking at rules in 38 European countries and found that France was the only one to ban religious headwear in sport.

“If the law passes, France will be the only democracy in the world to ban all religious head coverings or accessories in sports,” Cadene said.

A date has yet to be set for the divisive and controversial bill to be debated in the lower house of the French parliament.