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Anti-Hijab school fined
By Hossam Bahgat, Cairo
 The
administration of the private Champollion School in the Egyptian city of
Alexandria has learnt it the hard way that Egypt is not Turkey. An
Alexandria court has awarded 600,000 Egyptian pounds (US$160,000) on 20
March to the family of 12-years-old Azzah Muhammad Zaki and her three
brothers who were expelled last October by the school because she wore
hijab to her school. Champollion has also been ordered to open the doors
to the children.
The school, a subsidiary of a French NGO, prevented Azza from attending
classes at the beginning of the school year last September because she had
taken to wearing a headscarf. The school said that the French secular
education system prohibited showing any religious or political symbols
inside school, although France’s Council of State has said that wearing
a headscarf does not count unless it disrupts the schools functioning.
After Azza refused to take off her veil, the affair leaked to the press,
leading the schools parents association to expel Azza and her three
brothers Mohammed (10), Youssef (8), and Yassin (4).
Azzah, her brothers and parents went to court to seek justice. The French
Consulate in Alexandria surprised everyone when it submitted a plea to
intervene with the court on behalf of the school and the parents
association, despite the fact that it had denied throughout the crisis
that it had any relation with the school’s administration or anything to
do with its curriculum. Although the court allowed the consulate to
intervene, it did not accept any of its requests. The consulate asked the
court to consider two school officials (Barnaud and Cador) as
‘diplomats’ who could not be tried under Egyptian law. Chief Judge
Husain Al-Gabri rejected this and said that the international law does not
grant diplomatic immunity to bureaucrats.
Despite the damages awarded by the court, it looks like the family is not
going to stop there. "The courts verdict proves that the school is
Egyptian and is subject to Egyptian law," said Nadida Al Daqaq, the
family’s lawyer. "But despite that, it doesn't teach Arabic and it
has no files at the Ministry of Education." Al Daqaq has filed
another case with the Administrative Court calling into question the legal
basis of the school, which was formed following a cultural agreement
between Egypt and France in 1968.
While the case was still in court, both Azza and her family said that they
had no desire to go back to the school but after the verdict the four
children went to the school with their parents and lawyer and attended the
morning classes as an expression of their victory, but they have returned
to their new schools until the appeals process is completed. q |
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