PARIS — President Emmanuel Macron has
clashed with his rival
Marine Le Pen over her plan to ban women from wearing
the Islamic headscarf in public, with an eye on the votes of Muslims in the
second round of elections.
اضافة اعلان
Le Pen on April 24 will seek to cause the greatest
upset in modern French political history by defeating
Macron in a run-off in
presidential elections. While polls indicate Macron is ahead, they also point
to a far tighter race between the centrist and the far-right leader than in
their 2017 run-off.
Analysts say one reason for her advance is Le Pen’s
success in cultivating a more moderate image and portraying herself as the
candidate best equipped to deal with problems like rising prices.
But one signature hard-liner policy the
anti-immigration Le Pen has not dropped is her opposition to the Islamic
headscarf, saying women who wear the hijab in public in
France will be fined if
she wins power.
Macron meanwhile presented himself as a defender of
religious freedom, insisting that any ban on the veil would constitutionally
mean that all religious signs must be banned including the kippa and the cross.
‘You want to be the first?’
Visiting the eastern city of
Strasbourg on Tuesday, Macron during a walkabout to meet voters asked a veiled
women if she was wearing the headscarf by choice or obligation.
“It’s by choice. Totally by choice!” said the woman,
who proudly declared she was a feminist.
Macron replied, in clear reference to Le Pen’s plan:
“This is the best response to the rubbish that I have been hearing.”
He went even further on Thursday during a visit to
the northern port city of Le Havre: “There is not a single country in the world
that bans the headscarf in public. Do you want to be the first?”
Macron has in the
past himself run into controversy from Muslims and leaders of Islamic countries
over his tough stance over what the government calls radical Islamism.
But two Muslim groups on Friday, the Grand Mosque of
Paris and Rally of French Muslims, called on voters to choose Macron in the
second round.
Le Pen has said that wearing the Islamic headscarf
in public in France should be an offence punishable by a fine issued by the
police, like a traffic infraction.
Even within her own camp, the hard-liner stance has
caused controversy.
“It’s an error,” said
Robert Menard, mayor of the
town of Beziers and a supporter of Le Pen in the second round. “It’s not
possible to put in place.”
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