The controversy erupted in 2016. Several municipalities had seen their anti-burkini orders challenged in court. This had not yet been the case for the town hall of Mandelieu-La-Napoule (Alpes-Maritimes), which has prohibited, since 2012, access to its beaches and swimming to “people with clothing that does not respect the rules of health and safety which could impede disturbances to public order”.
The text, renewed on June 7 for the twelfth consecutive year and for application from June 15 to August 31, was the subject for the first time of an appeal by the League for Human Rights (LDH). Appeal which was rejected, the administrative court of Nice considering that the decree does not carry “a serious and manifestly illegal attack on any fundamental freedom”, according to a press release from the municipality and the court decision consulted by 20 minutes.
“Current context of particularly tense cohabitation”
The LDH considered that the freedoms “to manifest one’s religious convictions”, “to come and go” and “to dress in the public space” were hampered by the text signed by the mayor LR of Mandelieu, Sébastien Leroy. The judge in chambers of the administrative court of Nice concluded for his part that the decree was justified to “prevent the occurrence of disturbances to public order” in “the current context of particularly tense interreligious and intercommunity cohabitation”.
The town hall also recalls in its text that the latter had been adopted following “altercations which [s’étaient] produced in July 2012 between several women dressed under the arcades of the Château de la Napoule and bathers”. They had “gave rise to a stampede at the end of which the people dressed [avaient] ended up leaving the place.