Saint-Denis of Reunion (AFP)

"The wearing of the veil in the public space is not the business of the state". Thursday, Emmanuel Macron wanted to clarify his position on this controversy that for 15 days divides within his own government, and which have seized the right and extreme right.

On a trip to Reunion, the head of state, which his opponents and his supporters urged to intervene on this sensitive subject, decided by a pithy formula. "Wearing the veil in the public space is not my business, in the public services, at school, it's my business," he said.

"In the public services, there is a duty of neutrality.When we educate our children, we ask that there is no ostentatious religious sign.After, what happens in the public space is not the case of the State or the President of the Republic, "he said on the channel Meeting the 1st.

But he did not directly mention the case of veiled mothers accompanying school trips, which LR and the RN want to ban.

Relaunched by an RN elected who has attacked a veiled companion in a public meeting, the issue of the veil ignites debates and beyond school trips, extends instead of the veil in society.

Emmanuel Macron replied Thursday first to the president of RN Marine Le Pen, who calls for the ban on the veil and ostentatious religious symbols in "all public space".

And also to his Minister of Education Jean-Michel Blanquer, who judged that the veil was "not desirable in our society", because contrary to the values ​​of equality between men and women.

A position strongly criticized by Macronist deputies and, indirectly, by the government spokesman Sibeth Ndiaye to whom the veil during field trips does not pose "difficulties".

The majority appeared even more divided when Aurore Bergé, spokeswoman LREM, said she was ready to vote a text of the opposition LR, triggering an outcry from other elected Macronists.

LR has introduced a bill to ban the veil during school outings, which will be considered Tuesday in the Senate.

A text that is likely to feed the controversy while mid-October, Edouard Philippe had tried to whistle the end of the recess, noting that there was no question of a new law on accompanying school children.

- "Secession" -

The head of state, who has repeatedly called not to amalgam and "stigmatize" Muslims, has once again virulently attacked the "communautarisme", in reference to political Islam, that he has denounced several times in recent weeks.

"The veil is used in certain circumstances, some neighborhoods, for some, as an instrument of advocacy and separatism in the Republic, called communitarianism," said Emmanuel Macron.

While he has given up on a great speech on secularism, Emmanuel Macron has made the fight against communitarianism one of his battlehorses, in the approach of municipal elections where the majority like the opposition from the right and the Greens fear the emergence of community lists.

"Today, there are women and men who say that, by my religion, I no longer adhere to the values ​​of the Republic, I leave my child out of school, I refuse to go to bathe with children. others (...) and in the name of my religion I carry another political project ". "And that's a problem for me, with a claim that becomes political," insisted the head of state.

But he once again pleaded against the stigmatization of a single religion, after having in recent days feared a "coagulation" in the minds between communitarianism and Islam.

© 2019 AFP