A candidate for a radical French anti-capitalist party in the forthcoming regional elections wears a headscarf as a token of her Islamic faith, something that has raised eyebrows in this rigidly secular society.



All the more so because the NPA (New Anti-capitalist Party), led by Trotskyist postman Olivier Besancenot, is a party that generates headlines for its extreme left wing position on issues including militant secularism.



Scarf-wearing Ilham Moussaid (pictured), a student and a party treasurer, is NPA candidate for the regional council of Vaucluse in southern France, Besancenot confirmed to French daily Le Figaro.



“A woman can be a feminist, can uphold secular values and wear a [Islamic] headscarf at the same time,” he told the newspaper.

As the Sarkozy administration has launched yet another attack on those Islamic sartorial proclivities, on the usual twin grounds that the 'veil' constitutes an abridgement of womens' rights and signifies an Islamist challenge to fundamental French republican values, the NPA has answered with its own 'veiled' candidate for upcoming regional elections

Labels: anticapitalism, far left, france, islam, islamophobia, racism