These prayers took place in five establishments in the Alpes-Maritimes, from elementary school to high school, between mid-May and the beginning of June.
“Such facts are intolerable.” The Minister of National Education, Pap Ndiaye, announced on Friday June 16 that an investigation had been entrusted to the General Inspectorate following reports of attacks on secularism issued after the organization of prayers in establishments schools in the Alpes-Maritimes. “The National Education and the city of Nice are strengthening their cooperation so that the School remains protected from any religious influence. The principle of secularism is not negotiable in our Republic”wrote the minister on Twitter, above a joint press release with the mayor of Nice, Christian Estrosi (Horizons).
“Some students organized religious times and prayers during the midday break”, explain, in the press release, the Minister and the Mayor of Nice, “in three elementary schools in Nice, a college and a high school in the Alpes-Maritimes”. “An investigation by the General Inspectorate is being carried out to precisely establish the facts and draw useful conclusions”, they add. Lunch breaks in schools are generally the responsibility of municipalities because municipal employees are responsible for this extracurricular time.
Parents “summoned”, according to Pap Ndiaye
In a letter addressed to the Prime Minister and previously published on Twitter, Christian Estrosi writes that he was informed by the academy inspector of “extremely serious facts, which took place in various establishments in (his) city”. The mayor of Nice estimated, on France Bleu Azur, on Friday, that there is “necessarily an instrumentalization”.
“In two of these schools, it is prayers at the meridian hour. These prayers involved ten children of CM1, on May 16, for one of these schools, and three children of CM1, on June 5, for the other. For the third school it is a student of CM2 who took the initiative on June 8 to organize a minute of silence in memory of the Prophet and who called on his comrades to participate. was reported to the prefecture for suspicion of radicalization”, explained to AFP for his part Natacha Chicot, rector of the Nice academy. The rectorate claims to have warned the town hall of these facts on June 14.
THE “parents were summoned and, to my knowledge, understood that we do not have the right to pray in a school”, said Pap Ndiaye on Friday evening on BFM-TV. He assured that with “firmness, discernment and pedagogy, this is how we will move forward and progress to significantly reduce (…) the acts of attack on secularism”.