TUNISIAN GOVERNMENT CRACKS DOWN ON HIJAB

C O N F I D E N T I A L TUNIS 002565 SIPDIS SIPDIS NEA/MAG FOR HARRIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/02/2016 TAGS: PHUM PREL KPAO TS SUBJECT: TUNISIAN GOVERNMENT CRACKS DOWN ON HIJAB Classified By: CDA David Ballard for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) ¶1. (C) Summary: By all accounts, the number of women wearing the hijab or adopting some Islamic-inspired headdress in Tunisia has skyrocketed in recent years. In response, the GOT's periodic campaign of words and actions against Tunisian women wearing the hijab has increased in intensity. A 1981 regulation banning the wearing of "sectarian dress" in public offices and schools, previously arbitrarily applied to prevent women from wearing hijab, is reportedly being enforced with more regularity. Some women have been stopped in public, non-official places, detained and forced to remove their hijab by police. GOT and ruling party RCD officials have described the hijab as a potential threat to women's rights, and labeled the garment as "sectarian dress" and un-Tunisian. The GOT, which has long feared an Islamist political and security threat, undoubtedly views the rise in the number of hijab-wearers as a potential indication of Islamist sympathy on the part of the Tunisian public. However, many interlocutors feel that the GOT campaign to limit the hijab has the opposite effect of contributing to the phenomenon. Anecdotal evidence suggests that young women have put on, or been influenced by their husbands or boyfriends to wear, the garment not just for religious reasons, but in quiet political protest to a perceived threat to their religious beliefs and in solidarity with like-minded Tunisians and Muslims. End Summary. -------------- Hijab Wearing Increases -------------- ¶2. (C) By all accounts, the number of women wearing the Islamic headscarf, known as hijab, in Tunisia has skyrocketed in recent years. Although there have been no official surveys, walking or driving through any city in Tunisia one will notice a large percentage of women wearing the garment. Visitors who have returned to Tunisia after several years away often remark that the large increase in women wearing the hijab is among the first changes they noticed. Hijab-wearers range from teenagers to the elderly, and are seen in rural and urban areas alike. While many hijab-wearers themselves speak with pride about their choice to wear the garment as a reflection of their religious conviction, non-hijab wearers often remark that women wearing hijab do so either because it is "a la mode," or to make a political statement. They do not believe that the phenomenon necessarily reflects a growing religiosity among the populace. Others say, however, that more Tunisians are actively practicing Islam, pointing not only to the growing number of hijabs, but to packed mosques and prayer sessions at private residences. Contacts across the board point to the influence of pan-Arab media as the most significant factor explaining the rising numbers of hijabs on the Tunisian streets. An Embassy FSN also reported that two stores specializing in headscarves have opened in the Tunis suburbs. -------------- GOT Cracks Down on Hijab -------------- ¶3. (C) In 1981 the GOT passed Regulation no. 108, banning public employees, students and teachers from wearing what was described as "sectarian dress." In the years since, this regulation has been applied arbitrarily to prevent students and public officials from wearing hijab in their places of study or employment. At times, female students have been forced to remove their hijab before entering class, while at other times, no such rule has been applied. In recent months, however, the GOT's campaign of words and actions against Tunisian women wearing the hijab has increased in intensity as Regulation no. 108 is being applied with increased regularity. University and high school students are reportedly targeted more frequently and made to remove the hijab before attending class. Poloff interviewed one student on a university campus during a career day in April. She and some other students attending the university-sponsored event were wearing hijab without problem, and said they were able to attend class in hijab. However with the beginning of the 2006/2007 school year in September, students reported more instances of being forced to remove their hijab. Opposition paper Al Mawkif reported that the Governor of Manouba, a suburb of Tunis, accompanied by security officials, visited high schools, gathering all students wearing hijab, threatening them and forcing them to sign documents committing them to not wear hijab. According to the article, some students were suspended. Similar actions have been taken against young men wearing "Islamic style" beards. Beard-wearing students have reportedly been told to shave before being allowed to attend class, and other bearded men have allegedly been detained and forced to shave before being released. ¶4. (C) Although the official regulation banning hijab applies only to public officials, teachers and students, in recent weeks there have been reports of police stopping private individuals wearing hijab as well, forcing them to remove their head covering, and even detaining some. The wife of an Embassy FSN was picked up on October 9 by security officials while shopping on the street, detained for questioning, and criticized for wearing her headscarf. While detained, she said she saw other hijab-clad women being slapped by police, and a pile of discarded hijabs. Other reliable sources have reported seeing women and high-school aged girls stopped while shopping and told to remove their head-coverings. Another FSN saw a women shopping in a mall in Tunis' wealthy northern suburbs stopped by security officials and given the choice either to remove the hijab or leave. -------------- Hijab-Wearing Fulla Doll Removed from Shelves -------------- ¶5. (SBU) In mid-September, according to on-line reports, security forces began demanding stores remove Fulla Dolls from their shelves. Full, a cultural phenomenon in the Arab world, is a doll created by a Syrian manufacturer and marketed to children of Islamic and Middle-Eastern countries as a culturally appropriate alternative to Barbie. One of the Fulla's prominent characteristics is her hijab. According to local merchants, this was the reason they were forced to remove the doll from shelves. Poloff spoke with an employee at a large shopping mall in Tunis who confirmed that the store was "forbidden by police" to sell the doll. However, some street vendors have reportedly continued to sell the doll. -------------- GOT Speech Campaign Against Hijab Heats Up -------------- ¶6. (U) GOT officials have taken the anti-hijab campaign to the public in several high-profile speeches. The Minister of Religious Affairs has repeatedly characterized the hijab as "sectarian dress," and not representative of Tunisia. In a Ramadan event hosted by the ruling party RCD, party Secretary General M'henni, pointing to the prevalence of hijab as a threat to women's rights, reportedly said, "If today we accept the hijab, tomorrow we'll accept that women's rights to work and vote and receive an education be banned, and they'll be seen as just a tool for reproduction an housework... It is necessary to struggle against such a scourge to defend Islam and the rights of existing and future Tunisians." M'henni's comments were carried by the official Tunisian Press Agency. In the past few days, the GOT has engaged in a full-fledged press blitz, with presidential advisor Abdelaziz Ben Dhia, Religious Affairs Minister Boubaker El-Akhzouri and university professors railing against the garment, sentiments echoed on the front pages and in numerous editorials in every daily newspaper. ¶7. (SBU) However, there have been some mixed and confusing signals from the GOT on hijab. In a meeting with PolOff, the Director General of the Ministry of Religious Affairs spoke at great length about "acceptable headscarfs" worn traditionally in Tunisia (similar to loosely-tied head scarves traditionally associated with Russian peasant women) and the unacceptable hijab (fully covers the head and hair, is tighter to the face, and held in place with a pin). In a recent front page photo accompanying a story of a Ramadan Iftar dinner hosted by Ben Ali, all female invitees seated near the President and his wife were wearing headscarfs. Although two of the headscarves seemed to be what GOT interlocutors have referred to as Tunisian-style headcovering, one of the women in the photo appeared to be wearing the style of headscarf normally referred to as hijab. Online commentators have noted that female relatives of President Ben Ali publicly wore hijab while traveling to and from Mecca for the Hajj. -------------- Human Rights Organizations Respond -------------- ¶8. (SBU) Human rights activists and organizations, including the Tunisian Human Rights League and Saida Akremi of the International Association for the Support of Political Prisoners (AISPP) have refuted the GOT's assertion that a ban on hijab would protect human rights, saying that by banning hijab the GOT has infringed on free expression. Amidst the dialectical debate between human rights activists and the GOT, Akremi, in February, reportedly filed a lawsuit seeking to revoke the 1981 regulation banning hijab in state-run institutions. In an interview in Islam Online, reprinted on the website "Protect Hijab" (www.prohijab.net),Saida Akremi highlighted what many Tunisians feel is a growing contradiction between the GOT's promotion of Islam on one hand, and its restriction on hijab on the other: "The implementation of this law (Regulation no. 108) sharply conflicts with the Tunisian Constitution, which stipulates that Tunisia is an Islamic Country." ¶9. (C) On the other side of the debate, the secular Tunisian Association of Democratic Women (ATFD),a prominent, independent women's rights organization that has long taken a public stance against political Islam, views the hijab as symbolic of the threat that Islamist groups would pose to women's rights in Tunisia. According to Saida Garrache, Secretary General of the ATFD, the GOT, which has a long SIPDIS history of blocking ATFD meetings and harassing its activists due to their outspoken political opposition, recently invited the ATFD to appear on Tunisian television to speak out against the hijab. Garrache told PolOff that although the ATFD happens to agree with the GOT on the issue, they would not speak out on behalf of the government. ¶10. (C) An Embassy FSN (protect) active in the Tunisian Boy Scouts Association reported that he was informed by the association's head that all board members were invited to a meeting on October 18 with other civil society organizations to discuss the issue of hijab The meeting is reportedly to be hosted at RCD headquarters by Secretary General M'henni. The FSN predicted that M'henni will give instructions to pro-GOT civil society organizations on how to combat the prevalence of hijab. -------------- Comment -------------- ¶11. (C) A quick drive around any Tunisian city demonstrates that the GOT is losing the war against hijab. The number of hijab wearers continues to increase, and although students are forbidden to wear the garment on campus, young women leaving school can be seen putting their headscarves back on as soon as they are outside. While Tunisian officials publicly lament the hijab as a potential threat to women's rights, or as inconsistent with Tunisian tradition and culture, in fact the GOT is much more concerned about the potential political implications of a more fervently religious Tunisian population. The only significant political threat to the ruling party RCD in past decades was the Islamist Party An-Nahdha, which in 1989 elections won, according to various sources, between 15 and 30 percent of the vote in legislative elections, before being effectively eradicated by the GOT in the early nineties. It is not unimaginable that RCD party heavyweights driving around Tunis see each scarved head as a potential vote of support for an Islamist party. Ironically, Tunisian women, who were the bulwark against Islamic extremism under former President Bourguiba are now defying the Bourguiba legacy by donning hijab. ¶12. (C) The GOT thus faces the unenviable task of trying to gain the support of a population that increasingly associates with Islamic practices common elsewhere in the Arab world, but which have only recently gained prominence in Tunisia, while at the same time confronting the potential political threat such practices might pose to a secular government. Traditionally, President Ben Ali has maintained the balance by publicly associating himself with Islam, whether by hosting Ramadan dinners, building mosques, or traveling to Mecca. However, many Tunisians who see the hijab as an essential expression of their dedication to Islam, and who are reinforced in such belief by the increasingly dominant pan-Arab media, are questioning how the GOT can promote Islam and ban hijab. The juxtaposition is even greater as the GOT has chosen the holy month of Ramadan for its latest anti-hijab campaign. (Similar campaigns occurred under Bourguiba and early in Ben Ali's administration.) Thus, the GOT's increased pressure on hijab-wearers may be in fact contributing to the phenomenon, as young woman sport the garment not just for religious reasons, but as an emblem of political protest. As one Tunisian activist quipped: "The more the GOT cracks down, the more hijabs in the street." BALLARD