An administrative court on Wednesday suspended a decision by the grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar to ban schoolgirls and their female teachers from wearing niqab (full face-veil), as a lawyer for the Islamic seat of learning surprised the court saying that the niqab was not banned. "Schoolchildren at Al-Azhar's preparatory and secondary institutions can wear the niqab, simply because there was no administrative order to ban it," the court stated. It added that the female teachers in the Islamic institutions could also wear the niqab. A 14-year-old female student at a Cairo secondary institute had filed the lawsuit against Al-Azhar for being prohibited from attending classes by the principal, who claimed that the Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar Mohamed Sayyed Tantawi had banned the full face-cover. However, a lawyer for Tantawi said that there was no official decision to ban the niqab. "Only a note verbale from Al-Azhar's Higher Council said female girls and their female teachers are not allowed to wear the niqab inside exam rooms," he explained. At the beginning of the school year, Tantawi had told a young girl wearing the niqab in a classroom to take it off, saying it was not of Islam. Meanwhile, Egyptian universities insisted on banning veiled students from sitting for exams, unless they had a court ruling for each student. A ban on female university students wearing the niqab during examinations, which was imposed by Egypt's minister of education in October, was declared unconstitutional by Egypt's High Administrative Court last week. According to the court's ruling: Freedom to wear the niqab is guaranteed by human rights and constitutional liberties, and a girl's right to dress the way she sees fit in accordance with her beliefs and her social environment is a firm right that cannot be violated.
