Lleida proposes ban on full-face veil in public spaces

The Lleida local council has presented a proposal of new bylaws that includes a ban on the fulll-face veil in public spaces and municipal offices.

The measure is accompanied by a plan that includes actions to prevent women from suffering 'revictimization'.

The proposal is part of a set of municipal bylaws on civility and coexistence that the Socialist minority government plans to present to the council in June.

The prohibition would not apply "to places of worship or to spaces where it is customary to go with the face covered in accordance with accepted social custom, or when it is done in the exercise of a fundamental right."

Failure to comply with this point will be considered a minor infraction, with fines of between €300-€750.

The Lleida municipal government already tried to ban the burqa under former mayor Àngel Ros, although the Supreme Court overturned the measure.

Unlike then, the new proposal has a different "approach" and is not raised from the point of view of security, but "from an issue of fundamental rights, and in this case the right of women to be able to decide."

Catalan president Salvador Illa said he believes that "there is no racist attitude" or anything "against certain symbols" in the proposal.

The main opposition groups have questioned the proposal.

The leader of the opposition, the conservative People's Party's Xavier Palau, considers that the exemptions to the rule render the ban pointless.

He said that the exemptions legitimize the burqa and regulate it in a covert way. "No woman will admit that she wears it by imposition", assures Palau.