Muslim headscarf banned - in an Islamic country

Tunisia


The hijab, the traditional headscarf that many Islamic women wear and that has become a subject of heated debate in countries like France and the U.K. , where large Muslim populations live, has been banned - in Tunisia, a majority-Muslim country in northern Africa.
Lately, Tunisian police have been enforcing, "with renewed vigor," a 1981 decree that "prohibits women from wearing Islamic headscarves in public places." The restriction requires that Tunisian women not wear Islamic dress in schools or government offices. "Police...have been stopping women on the streets and asking them to remove their headscarves and sign pledges that they will not go back to wearing them....Human-rights groups [have] describe[d] the move as unconstitutional." (BBC)

Agence France Presse
Tunisian women are not allowed to wear headscarves in schools or government offices
Some background about Tunisia: The former French colony became an independent state in 1956; its first president, Habib Bourguiba, steered the new nation for three decades, "repressing Islamic fundamentalism and establishing rights for women unmatched by any other Arab nation." (C.I.A. Factbook) Tunisia's current president, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who has been in power since 1987, has also sought to keep a lid on Islamic fundamentalists in the political arena. He keeps a close eye on the press, too. Dissent is not tolerated.
Officials of Ben Ali's government say it's extremists who have been urging women to wear traditional garments and exploiting religion for political purposes. They've also suggested that such encouragement may be coming from outside the country. As a result of the decree against Islamic dress, Tunisian women who insist on wearing garments like the hijab may face losing their jobs.

Agence France Presse
What really concerns Tunisian President Ben Ali is the threat a rise in fundamentalist-Islamic political forces could pose to his government
A commentator in Tunisia's La Presse applauded Ben Ali for setting a policy that "rejects extremists from all sides" and that aims to foster "moderation and tolerance." Similarly, Tunisian academic Mongia Souaïhi told Le Renouveau in an interview that Islam in Tunisia must be "anchored in modernity." She noted that, whereas long ago, in the era of Mohammed, Islam's revered prophet, face- or body-covering garments prescribed for women "served to differentiate the slave from the mistress," there "have not been slaves or masters in Tunisia in a long time, but rather human beings, men or women, free and equal." Souaïhi observed: "The habit doesn't make the monk, right?"
The secretary-general of Ben Ali's ruling Constitutional Democratic Rally political party, said: "If we accept today the wearing of the headscarf, tomorrow we'll be led to accept that a woman's right to work, to vote and to education should be denied, and that she should be confined to a procreating role." (Tunis Afrique Presse)
About Ben Ali's headscarf ban, the BBC reports: "Tunisian human-rights activists [have] accused the authorities of depriving women of a basic freedom guaranteed by the constitution."