French lawmakers have proposed a hijab ban in competitive sports. The impact on women could be devastating.

ReplayMore Videos ...MUST WATCHCan you play sports in a hijab? In France, some lawmakers don't want you to 03:31

By Amy Woodyatt, Nada Bashir and Dalal Mawad, CNN

Updated 1415 GMT (2215 HKT) February 1, 2022

(CNN)Mama Diakité is 23, and has been playing club football for the past 10 years. But all of that could change, she says, if a ban on wearing the hijab while playing sports proposed by the French senate becomes law.

«It almost means the end of soccer for me,» Diakité, a member of Paris based Les Hijabeuses, a collective of young hijab-wearing female footballers campaigning against the ban, and fighting what they describe as the exclusion of Muslim women from sports. Paris based Les Hijabeuses are a collective of young hijab-wearing female footballers tackling what they say is exclusion of Muslim women from sports.The French senate in January voted 160 to 143 to ban the wearing of the hijab and other «ostensible religious symbols» in sports competitions following a proposed amendment from Les Republicains, a right wing party, who argued that headscarves can risk the safety of athletes wearing them. Les Républicains Senator Jaqueline Eustache-Brinio said that the French government must have the «courage» to resist what she described as the «Islamist grip» on the country — something her party believes has taken hold in both sport and education. «We must have the courage, wherever possible to do so, to preserve the unity and cohesion of the Republic,» she told RMC, radio partner of CNN affiliate BFMTV.Read MoreAn estimated five million people make up France's Muslim population, the largest in Europe.«Sport and school are two places that we must preserve and for which we must resist. Sport is a place where — whether you are