[Xaccers]

From memory of the shops, streets around Kilo5 and corniche, the majority of women showed their faces.

Many women choose to cover their face in public because they believe that is what their religion requires of them. Whether it does or does not, it is their personal religion.
How is punishing someone for following their religious beliefs with a fine and what, prison if they don't pay the fine, any different to someone forcing those who do not wish to cover their faces to wear the veil?
My understanding of the French ban is that if a woman wears a veil, she's fined, and if they can prove she's been forced into it, her husband would be fined too.
So if she is being forced to wear it otherwise she'd be housebound, but chooses to protect her husband either through fear or loyalty, she's punished.
How is that justice?

You can say women only choose to wear it to make a political statement til you're blue in the face. The fact is most chose to wear it because they believe it complies with their religion, not to make a political statement.