A new ban and tensions. A father is in police custody on Friday in Clermont-Ferrand after making death threats against a principal who refused access to high school to his daughter wearing an abaya. The man is being prosecuted for “threat with a view to intimidating a person responsible for a public service mission”, specified the public prosecutor of Clermont-Ferrand, Dominique Puechmaille, confirming information from the regional daily The mountain.
The father should be the subject of a “direct summons with judicial supervision”, added the magistrate, specifying that a complaint had been filed. The police custody which began on Thursday was still in progress on Friday morning, according to a police source. Thursday morning, the officials of the Ambroise-Brugière high school filtered the entry into application of the national directives concerning the prohibition of the abaya. A high school student who wore the garment was asked to remove it and was denied access to the establishment after her refusal, according to the same source.
“These are extremely shocking threats”
A little later, his father called the school and got an agent and then a senior education advisor. To each of them, he allegedly made death threats aimed at the principal. “These are threats that are extremely shocking. I had the principal on the phone yesterday. I obviously assured him of all my support, that of the government, the State and more generally I believe our fellow citizens in the face of these threats which are unacceptable and unspeakable,” declared the Minister of National Education Gabriel Attal , during the inauguration of the Arnaud Beltrame high school in Meyzieu (Rhône).
He indicated that the principal concerned would benefit from “constant support in terms of security: the national police will be at his side” and from legal support. On August 27, Gabriel Attal announced a ban on the wearing of the abaya in public schools, colleges and high schools. On Thursday, the Council of State validated the ban on this long covering dress, which according to it carries a “logic of religious affirmation” prohibited in educational establishments.
On Monday, less than 300 students, out of the 12 million who returned to school this week, presented themselves in abaya in front of their establishment, and 67 of them refused to remove it, according to the Minister of Education.