The sun is already beating down on the artificial pitches and the sound system is blaring out the latest hit from the Parisian rapper MHD. “Would you mind giving me the small ladder so that I can put the banner up?” one young female footballer asks another. The words on the banner read: “Football For All”. It is the morning of Sunday June 13th and 16 teams from across the Paris region have turned up for a women's football tournament organised by Les Hijabeuses at La Courneuve, just north of the capital.
This association, which is supported by the citizens rights group Alliance Citoyenne who operate in working class areas, was set up in May 2020. Its members are young women footballers who have been discriminated against and even excluded from the pitch because they wanted to wear headscarves during official matches.
“Today there are close to 180 women in Les Hijabeuses, sporting and non sporting, Muslims and non-Muslims,” said Bouchra Chaïb, a 27-year-old amateur footballer from nearby La Plaine Saint-Denis. “Last year we started a campaign to tackle the Fédération Française de Football (FFF) [editor's note, the sport's governing body in France] over headscarf discrimination. They met us in March 2021 but since then there's been nothing. The FFF are no longer replying to us even though the 2021-2022 season will begin soon.”
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Authorised by FIFA, banned in France
As with the international federations running basketball, handball and karate, football's governing world body, the International Federation of Association Football (FIFA), has allowed the wearing of headscarves since 2014. Yet despite a warning from the world body, the FFF in France has not implemented this reform. It still bans the wearing of headscarves during competitive matches, basing its decision on the grounds of hygiene, safety and secularism; the French state already bans the wearing of the headscarf in schools, with the authorities citing the secular nature of the Republic.
“There's a vagueness about the rules in France over wearing a headscarf during sporting activities,” said Bouchra Chaïb. “Hygiene and safety are bogus arguments because there's a hijab that's approved for use in sports competitions.”
Yet while France's rugby authority, the Fédération Française de Rugby (FFR), allows players to “wear a headscarf on condition that it doesn't constitute a danger for the person who wears it or for other players”, Article 1 of the FFF's statutes states: “During competitions or events organised on Federation land or in connection with these events and competitions, the wearing of any symbol or costume that conspicuously displays a political, philosophical religious or trade union affiliation is banned.”
Founé Diawara, 21, has been kicking a ball around since she was a young child. Having watched the women's World Cup in 2014 she decided to join the sports club at Meaux, north-east of Paris. “I was 15 and I was the only person wearing a headscarf at the club,” she said. “For my first official match I just wore a turban but the referee came straight up to me and gave me a choice: take it off so I could play, or go and sit in the dugout. I decided not to play but my coach didn't understand; according to him I should have sacrificed myself for the team. He then started constantly putting me down during training sessions and no longer called me up for competitions. I felt humiliated and I had the feeling I wasn't fully appreciated.”
Bouchra Chaïb has her own story to tell. “I have always dreamed of playing football but I put my studies first,” she said. “Three years ago I registered with Argenteuil FC [editor's note, a club in the north-west suburbs of the capital]; I was made very welcome there by everyone. I was finally able to take part in a competitive match but it turned into a nightmare.”
During the pre-match warm-up the referee hurried towards the young woman, demanding that she take off her head protector. “I used the pretext of having a scalp condition to be able to wear this headgear - one which some sportspeople use - but the referee said to me : 'We know perfectly well why you're wearing that!'”
Bouchra Chaïb continued: “I felt so bad. I've worn a headscarf since I was 13 and since then, at school, during [workplace] training and at work I've constantly had comments. This was the straw which broke the camel's back: I just want to relax doing my favourite sport.”
Karthoum Dembélé, who is originally from Nanterre just west of Paris, is aged 19 and has played for Sèvres FC 92 in the south-western suburbs of the capital for the last four years. She said: “It's stressful at each official match, because with the vagueness over the headscarf, you may only find out on the day of the match itself that a referee, a coach and even opposing players don't want us on the pitch.”
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The wearing of headscarves in sport is a current political issue. On Wednesday June 9th the special commission examining the French government's proposed new law against 'separatism' used an amendment to remove a paragraph that had been inserted in the draft bill when it went through the French Parliament's second chamber, the Senate, on April 9th. That paragraph, backed by senator Michel Savin from the conservative Les Républicains (LR) party, aimed to exclude anyone wearing a headscarf from sports competitions.
In their amendment removing this proposed measure, the bill's rapporteurs from the ruling La République en Marche (LREM) party, Anne Brugnera and Florent Boudié, said: “The participants in sporting competitions and sporting events - a term incidentally which is very vague – can be considered as customers: they are not required to respect the principle of neutrality, which is only applicable to actions in the public sector. The wearing of religious symbols, to be distinguished from an act of proselytism, is possible, except for people representing an accredited federation or mandated by them.”
Bouchra Chaïb is quite clear about the issue. “We're just asking for the FFF to comply with the legislation.”
When contacted by Mediapart, the French football authorities said: “The FFF has a public service mission: it applies the Republic's laws. It supports and defends the values of secularism, of community life, of neutrality, of combating all forms of discrimination and does not allow the display of conspicuous political or religious symbols in the context of the collective and public practice of football and in its competitions… On this issue, as on others concerning community life and playing together, the FFF works in particular with the Observatoire de la Laïcité [editor's note, a consultative body on secularism that was abolished by the government on June 5th 2021 and will be replaced by an inter-ministerial body].”
Coming together through football
The women's teams who turned at the Les Hijabeuses tournament has done so to play football, but also to show solidarity with fellow footballers who are excluded from matches simply because of their religious affiliations.
Teresa Suárez, who plays for Les Dégommeuses, a Parisian football team largely composed of lesbians and trans people who fight against discrimination, explained why she had come to the event. “We are here to show our support for Les Hijabeuses,” she said. “Under intersectional [editor's note, an approach which involves the interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender] logic, and as part of the struggle against all forms of oppression, the battle of women who wear headscarves who are banned from playing football is also our battle. And after the different lockdowns it's also important to rekindle links on the pitch, to come together using football as a tool of solidarity and combat.”
As the barbecues were lit up for the lunch break, Fati Rouina, captain of Les Cacahuètes Sluts – a team from north Paris – proclaimed via a megaphone: “What moves me most in Les Hijabeuses's message is the message that you mustn't leave anyone out. We see here the full diversity of the footballers who have been invited. They are women who have less access to football because they wear a headscarf, because they come from such and such a district, because they are of such and such a colour, or because they are LGBT.”
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The five-a-side matches took place in searing heat until 5pm, against a backdrop of Afro Trap music from a DJ hired for the occasion. Meanwhile a few youngsters from neighbouring pitches stopped to comment on the dancing dribbling skills of the best players on display. Les Hijabeuses also made use of the opportunity to pass around a petition – they got more than 200 signatures by the end of the day – that will soon be sent to the FFF. It is another way of keeping the pressure up on football's governing body in France.
A former professional who played for the French national team, Jessica Houara, also turned up briefly to lend her support, posing for a photo with the young players, fists raised.
The tournament itself was won by the SMB team – the initials stand for 'Samba' – who also picked up the trophy for top scorer. Two years ago two sisters from this team – Imène and Chahira Slimani – organised the first Coupe d’Afrique des Nations football tournament for women in La Goutte-d’Or, a working class district of north Paris.
Meanwhile, Founé Diawara from Meaux used the sound system's microphone to sum up the mood and to warn her fellow competitors: “We're in a country that's clearly Islamophobic. But today they can no longer walk all over us, that's over.”
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- The original French version of this article can be found here.
English version by Michael Streeter