VIDEO. "It's an injustice": basketball player for 10 years, Salimata was excluded from the field because of her veil

“Salimata is the backbone of our team.

She is a very good player on whom we count and she is also an ambassador for the sport.

There, we are deprived of a model for the youth.

Sébastien Marie-Sainte, the president of the basketball club of Aubervilliers (Seine-Saint-Denis) cannot believe it.

Salimata Sylla, one of her star players, who officiates as a playmaker in N3, was excluded during a competition in the north of France in early January.

For the first time.

The match had not started when the referee informed the coach that the 25-year-old - who has played for more than ten years in the French Championship - would remain on the bench.

What are we accusing him of?

To wear a headgear.

Salimata, of Muslim faith, indeed covers her hair with a sports hijab, an accessory sold by many sports equipment manufacturers for several years now.

She, who has been wearing it for almost three years, had never been prevented from playing in competition until now.

“I win my place for this match, I get up on a Sunday to drive three hours to Escaudain (Hauts-de-France), I change and I warm up with my teammates to then be excluded?

While I have an approved headgear?

asks Salimata Sylla.

“I felt humiliated,” she admits, hurt.

A situation all the more incomprehensible for her who works daily to make her sport more inclusive and accessible to young people and women, sometimes with her associative cap, sometimes as an ambassador for sports brands in their campaigns on social networks. .

Read also“No one has to choose what emancipates us”: Muslim women make their voices heard behind #PasToucheAmonHijab

A recent reminder to referees

If the regulations of the French Basketball Federation (FFBB) indeed mention the prohibition of headgear for “three or four years” according to the president of the Aubervilliers club, “the witch hunt” would only have really started. in January and "Sali" - as her friends call her - was "not an isolated case".

And this impression in recent days of a "sorting" among the players present on the field is not due to chance: a reminder of the rule was actually sent to the referees in December.

Le Parisien obtained the e-mail sent by one of the leaders of the Ile-de-France Basketball League.

The subject of which is "Info wearing the veil", even though this term is never used in the regulations, [since it can legally be considered as discriminatory because it directly targets the Muslim community] which rather mentions the term "headgear".

"A disgusting decision" according to Romy, one of Sali's teammates who watched - helpless - as he was excluded from the field.

“Wearing the veil is a non-subject between us, recalls Muriella, another player.

We are all here to play sports, not to look at each other.

“Romy is ironic:” When the federation speaks of “headgear”, I find it hypocritical.

Looks like the players come home with a cowboy hat.

Contacted several times, the FFBB did not respond to our requests on the reason for this rule which is not applied by FIBA, the international basketball federation.

Nor on the safety of sports hijabs that are offered for sale by many sports team sponsors around the world, such as Puma, Nike, Adidas, Asics, etc.

Salimata also recalls that in a year, France will host the Olympic and Paralympic Games “and that several foreign athletes will come to participate with their headgear while at the same time, we exclude the French women who wear it.

The French Basketball Federation is also the only sports body - with the French Football Federation - to prevent the wearing of the veil in its competitions.

And more generally, on a global scale where France is an exception, even at European level.

Read alsoWomen “have the right” to wear the veil at football, supports Minister Elisabeth Moreno

Already in the summer of 2022, Diaba Konaté, a French basketball player who studies and plays in the United States, was prevented from playing in France during the Open Plus tournament, organized in Pouliguen (Loire-Atlantique), by the French Federation.

Having used to play with her hijab across the Atlantic, the player had expressed her indignation on her social networks.

“Why go against the ethical charter which encourages female practice and to fight against all discrimination?

»

More recently, Shahed Darvish, the president of the club of Bonneuil-sur-Marne (Val-de-Marne) published a strong press release to indicate that he would no longer participate in any committee meeting as long as “this absurd rule” which “ women's basketball night" will be present in the rules.

He lets it be known that he will retire from the presidency of the club at the end of the season if nothing is done on the side of "instances completely disconnected from reality".

“My position is not to incriminate one instance more than another, tempers Sébastien Marie-Sainte, in Aubervilliers.

But rather to say that there is a rule today and that it is not necessarily fair.

So, what do we do so that no one is harmed, so that we can avoid discrimination?

The ethical charter of basketball published a few years ago spoke of encouraging female practice and fighting against all discrimination.

Why go against this text today?

»

And Salimata to conclude: “I just want to play basketball.

And that other women and girls have the same opportunity.

It’s serious to ask for that in 2023.”