News

The Newspaper

Archives

Press Releases

Subscribe

Advertise

Mailing list

Links

About us

What's on and where

Messages for
The Muslim News

Contact The Muslim News

The Muslim News on your PDA

Back to index

Issue 230, Friday 27 June 2008 - 24 Jumad al-Akhbar 1429

Opposition in Ireland calls for headscarf ban

By Zainab Hemani

The two main opposition parties in Ireland recently demanded public schools in Ireland not to allow young Muslim girls to wear the religious headscarf. Labour’s Ruairi Quinn said immigrants who came to Ireland needed to fit into Ireland’s culture.
“If people want to come into a western society that is Christian and secular, they need to conform to the rules and regulations of that country. A manifestation of religious beliefs in such a way is unacceptable and draws attention to those involved. I believe in a public school situation they should not wear a headscarf,” the Labour spokesman on Education and Science said.
Brian Hayes, his Fine Gael counterpart backed this. He told The Muslim News, “I think it would be sensible if we had a uniform policy, in other words that the hijab would not be allowed in public schools because we don’t really allow religious symbols within public education. [However] it is to each individual religious school to decide themselves whether or not they want hijab to be allowed in those schools.”
When asked whether other religious symbols should be allowed in public schools, such as the Christian crucifix or the Jewish kippah, Hayes said that in public schools, we should have the same policy and no huge, overt religious symbols or cultural symbols.
“It should apply for everyone in public education. However, in individual religious schools, it is a matter for Catholics, Protestants and Muslims to decide. My argument is not to do with religious schools that under our constitution have a fundamental right to their own policy, their own ethos. My argument is in relation to public schools. I think we should have one uniform position over there,” he added.
Hayes also told The Muslim News that this issue needed to be debated before a decision was made. “I have no hard and fast position on this. If a position is arrived at the end of that debate which is nuanced and is including with the Irish tradition, then that’s fine with me. We cannot become subservient to different cultural and religious expressions. There are many young Muslim women who don’t wear hijab and they are fine,” he argued and added that public schools in Ireland made up only 20% and that the rest of 80% were religious schools.
When asked for his opinion on the matter, Hassan Mansour from Belfast Islamic Centre told The Muslim News in a statement that he disagreed with Quinn and considered his statements as religious discrimination. “I believe the enforcement of the removal of headscarves would create unrest within the communities. It may cause further disintegration and division, depending on the resources available to the Muslims. If they can, then more Muslim schools would be built to accommodate the students,” he said.
“The headscarf is a religious obligation and Muslim women should have the choice to wear them if they wish to do so and follow the Rules of God. Democracy, which is always waived in front of our faces calls for the freedom of speech and expression, however, we always see that it does not apply to Muslims as it does to others,” he added.
Integration Minister, Conor Lenihan, said he had no problem with students wearing the hijab. “For those that wear the hijab, it’s an issue of modesty. It’s not so long since Irish women wore headscarves to church, so we have to respect that,” he said adding that there have been no cases in Ireland of Muslim students being prevented from wearing the hijab in school. “If there was a school which banned the hijab I would like to know on what grounds,” he stated.
The National Consultative Committee on Racism and Interculturalism (NCCRI) stated that the headscarf had not been an issue until now. NCCRI Director, Philip Watt, said anyone advocating a ban on the hijab might or might not have fully considered the consequences of such a ban in respect of all religious symbols and obligations in schools. “The banning of obligations and symbols in schools which are widely accepted in other parts of Europe and the rest of the world will potentially damage Ireland’s image and interest abroad,” he said.
The Education Act states that school boards should respect diversity in people’s values, beliefs and traditions. However, individual school authorities are responsible for the drawing up of school rules, including school-uniform requirements.