Sarkozy is "Leading the crusade" in Libya says French interior minister

Whatever was France's interior minister Claude Guéant thinking about when he said during an interview on Monday of the French president Nicolas Sarkozy's role in Libya that, "Fortunately, the president has been leading the crusade to mobilise the UN security council, the Arab League and the African Union."

France's interior minister Claude Guéant (screenshot from interview)

Yes "crusade". That's the term he used. Not exactly one lacking historical connotations as many in France have been quick to point out.

Even though he has since admitted that, "With hindsight I should have expressed myself differently and said perhaps that the president had 'mobilised public opinion to present persuading arguments to the security council'," the damage had been done and the word was out there for all to read and hear.

"Scary," is how the leader of the opposition Socialist party Martine Aubry described Guéant's choice of word.

"He would have done better to have kept quiet," said Aubry's predecessor and likely candidate for the party's presidential primaries, François Hollande.

"It was more than unfortunate, it was a word he shouldn't have uttered."

Even some within his party, the governing centre-right Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (Union for a Popular Movement,UMP) were hard-pressed to defend Guéant's choice of word with the foreign minister Alain Juppé describing it quite clearly as a "blunder" and "one that had nothing to do with what was happening (in Libya)."

But was it really just an "unfortunate" term and an example of a man not used to the political limelight. Or is there something more sinister going on?

At face value Guéant certainly appears to be "like a bull in a china shop," as Le Point journalist Anna Cabana described the interior minister during her piece on national public radio France Inter on Wednesday morning.

Less than a month into the job and he has already managed to tell the country not only that Sarkozy has "led the crusade" but also that the "French don't feel at home in France".

Guéant though is no political beginner as Cabana makes clear. He has served for the past nine years as one of Sarkozy's closest political advisors and his views and thoughts must be well known to the French president.

Sure he has now stepped out of the shadows and is busy proving himself to be every bit as crass in his statements as his predecessor in the job and another Sarkozy crony, Brice Hortefeux (whose 2009 racial slur against Amine Benalia-Brouch, a young party activist of Algerian origin, still sticks in the craw).

But is this really just inexperience at play or a deliberate strategy by Sarkozy in the run-up to next year's presidential elections.

Has Guéant in fact been placed intentionally in the hot seat to try to appeal to voters who might otherwise drift towards the far-right Front National.

Remember its leader, Marine Le Pen, is currently buoyed by opinion polls that show her as a serious threat to Sarkozy's chances of making it through to the second round of voting in those elections.

Can Guéant really be the fool his statements appear to suggest. Is he just naïve when it comes to being in the public eye?

Watch this space for answers.

At this rate Guéant is not going to leave it blank for very long.

Racism in France - one man's experiences

It's hard to overlook a piece* written in Thursday's issue of the national French daily, Le Monde, by the journalist Mustapha Kessous.

It's another reminder as to just how racism persists here in France.

And of course it couldn't be more timely in light of the recent remarks made by the interior minister, Brice Hortefeux at the ruling centre-right Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (Union for a Popular Movement, UMP) party's summer conference at Seignosse in southwestern France at the beginning of the month.

Hortefeux was captured on video saying in the presence of Amine Benalia-Brouch, a young party activist of Algerian origin, that he (Benalia-Brouch), "Doesn't match the prototype. We always need one. It's when there are lots of them that there are problems."and the reaction there has been to them.

Many viewed the comment as a racial slur, but others shrugged it off and tried to explain it as part of the minister's "sense of humour".

Kessous of course begins his piece with a reference to that incident, describing how he first met Hortefeux for an interview in April 2008 when he was still the immigration minister.

"I had never met him before," he writes.

"We waited at his ministry and when Brice Hortefeux arrived, he shook my hand, smiled and said 'Do you have your papers?"

Kessous outlines some of the difficulties he has had even in his job as a journalist for such an illustrious newspaper simply because he is "of Arab origin with a slightly darker complexion and a Moslem."

He writes how he thought that his status as a journalist at one of the country's most respected newspapers would somehow shield him from encountering racism.

He was wrong.

When he covered the Tour de France in July 2008, one spectator refused to talk to him preferring instead to be interviewed by one of his colleagues, who later admitted that an employee for the organisers had also rung him to ask whether Kessous was his chauffeur.

Kessous tells of the time when he wanted to interview the director of a psychiatric hospital, and how he easily got an appointment with her when he introduced himself over the 'phone as Monsieur Kessous from Le Monde (dropping his first name).

"When I arrived, the director's secretary informed her that I was there," he writes.

"A woman on crutches passed in front of me and when I opened the door for her she looked at me without saying 'thank you' or 'hello'," he continues.

Then the woman, who was in fact the director with whom he had an interview, asked the secretary where the journalist was and received the reply that he was just behind her.

"'You have your press card? You have your identity card?'" was what Kessous was asked, reminding us that there had been no welcome yet.

Kessous writes of how he has had to put up with racism and insults from an early age.

"We were one of the few families of North African origin where we lived (in the centre of Lyon)," he says.

"In order to 'succeed' I requested to be sent to a catholic school, and there I went through hell being told to 'Go back to your country' from fellow pupils and teachers alike."

It was a racism that followed him through the education system to the time when he was taking a higher course at journalism school in 2007 and was faced by questions during his oral examination such as, "Are you Moslem" and "If you're a journalist at Le Monde, is it because they need to have an Arab on staff?"

Clearly those working in the field of education are just as prone to racism as the country's police force.

Who can forget the case of Abdeljalel El Haddioui, a 40-year-old police officer who in 2007 made it through to the final stages of a selection process for a higher grade and had to face questions from the board such as "Does your wife wear a headscarf?" and "Do you practise Ramadan?" or "Don't you find it strange that there are Arab ministers in the government?"

And apropos the police, Kessous ends his piece with an incident that occurred recently as he parked his scooter outside the building housing Le Monde and how he was approached by officers asking him what he was doing there and for proof that he was a journalist.

"I could recount any number of events like that," he writes.

"I'm described as being of foreign origin, a beur, rabble or riff-raff (racaille), an Islamist, a delinquent, a 'beurgeois' a child of immigrants...but never a Frenchman. In short, French."

*You can read the full article (in French) here.

Sarkozy sidesteps minister's racial slur

It's a story that has been making the headlines here in France for over a week now; the incident when the interior minister, Brice Hortefeux, apparently made a remark which many interpreted as being racist.

It occurred at the ruling centre-right Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (Union for a Popular Movement, UMP) party's summer conference at Seignosse in southwestern France at the beginning of the month.

Hortefeux was captured on video saying in the presence of Amine Benalia-Brouch, a young party activist of Algerian origin, that he (Benalia-Brouch), "Doesn't match the prototype. We always need one. It's when there are lots of them that there are problems."

When the video made its way on to the Net, the reactions and criticisms came thick and fast.



The opposition Socialist party and groups representing ethnic minorities and those campaigning against racism roundly condemned the remarks, with some calling for the minister's resignation.

And the spokesman for the Socialist party, Benoît Hamon questioned what Hortefeux was "still doing in the government".

But just as quickly, colleagues of Hortefeux leapt to the minister's defence.

The prime minister, François Fillon, told national TF1 television that the interior minister had been "the victim of a fairly scandalous campaign of defamation," and that, "I reiterate that he (Hortefeux) has my full support."

The environment minister, Jean-Louis Borloo insisted that "Brice Hortefeux is anything but a racist," and Fadela Amara the junior minister for urban policy and herself of North African origin, shrugged off the remark as being part of Hortefeux's "sense of humour".

It seems that Hortefeux is well known for making jokes that aren't always appreciated.

From Brussels though came a somewhat dissenting voice within the UMP in the shape of the reaction from a former cabinet colleague, Rachida Dati, also of North African descent.

Now a member of the European parliament, Dati said on national radio that although she hadn't seen the clip but had only read the transcript in the newspaper, she still found the remark inappropriate.

"I don't agree that it is humourous rather that it's tactless," she said.

"For me racism has nothing to do with humour."

For his part, Hortefeux has not apologised for the remarks he made but has said that he "regretted" the resulting controversial and "unnecessary" debate that followed.

And he had the support of Benalia-Brouch, who said that he didn't understand why there had been such a debate surrounding the video and that there had been no racist intent in what the minister had said and no offence taken.

But noticeably quiet up until now has been the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy.

The two men are close political allies and long-time friends, and indeed it was Sarkozy who brought Hortefeux into the government in June 2007 as immigration minister, then appointed him at the beginning of this year to employment before offering him the job of interior minister in June's reshuffle.

Sarkozy is keen to keep Hortefeux in government, and twice in recent months has taken steps to ensure that he remains there; first by preventing him from taking up the seat he won in June's European parliamentary elections and then by insisting that he should not run in next year's regional presidential elections.

So what has Sarkozy's comment been on the whole matter?

Well according to the national daily, Le Figaro, the French president had rather a different reaction to most on seeing the video.

"When you're a minister you are always on duty," Sarkozy reportedly told him.

"And when you're minister of the interior that counts double," he continued.

"You should have been wearing a suit and tie and not have put in an appearance so casually dressed."

Local French politician caught napping

Oh dear, we've all been there haven't we?

Attending some meeting perhaps where the subject was as dry as stale bread, or back in our student days battling the heavy-lid syndrome as the lecturer attempted to bring new meaning to the word "boring".

Whatever the cause might have been, a quick forty winks when inappropriate never really used to be that embarrassing or much of a problem as there was usually a helpful person sitting next to you able to give a discreet prod when necessary.

But those days it seems are long gone, and the ease with which anyone can now take a compromising photo' or video with a mobile 'phone or digital camera and then distribute it on the Net leaves us all vulnerable.

And such perhaps, is the case with a certain local politician here in France, who was quite literally caught napping caught on the job..

Jean-Marie Albouy-Guidicelli is the deputy mayor of the town of Montereau-Fault-Yonne in the département of Seine-et-Marne, south east of the French capital.

At just 38 years of age, the member of the governing centre-right party, Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (Union for a Popular Movement, UMP) is a busy man with a packed schedule; take a look at his website for proof of that.

A website that's evidence that he's more than aware of how he can promote himself via the Net and backed up by the fact that he can also be found on Facebook.

In other words Albouy-Guidicelli belongs to a generation which is certainly more than au fait with modern technology, its uses and abuses and its potential pitfalls.

Posted on the video hosting service site Dailymotion on Tuesday, the 42-second clip shows Albouy-Guidicelli losing the battle to concentrate during a meeting in the town hall.

Grosse fatigue pour le 1er adjoint de Montereau-Fault-Yonne
par HAUTEKIET

All right, so he doesn't have the profile of the interior minister Brice Hortefeux, who was captured on camera (a mobile 'phone) making what many in France consider to be a racist comment at the UMP’s summer conference at Seignosse southwestern France last week.

But perhaps the polemic that surrounded that particular incident might have encouraged Albouy-Guidicelli to be a little more vigilant.

Hortefeux, you might remember, was filmed saying to a young activist of Algerian origin, Amine Benalia-Brouch, in an apparent reference to North Africans that, "He doesn't match the prototype. We always need one. It's when there are lots of them that there are problems."

The video inevitably found its way on to the Net and hit the headlines with opposition calls for the minister's resignation.



For his part, Hortefeux has not apologised for the remarks he made but has said that he "regretted" the resulting controversial and "unnecessary" debate that followed.