Grégoire de Fournas is banned from the chamber for 15 days and suspended for two months on half his salary after he reprimanded a black parliamentarian during a debate
The National Assembly on Friday sanctioned far-right deputy Grégoire de Fournas with his 15-day temporary ban from the chamber and the deprivation, for two months, of half his parliamentary salary for his racist statements. This is the most severe sanction provided for in the regulations of the National Assembly. It had only been applied once since 1958.
The incident occurred on Thursday during audit questions to the government. Carlos Martens Bilongo, a black deputy from La Insumisa, asked a question about immigrants being rescued by NGO ships in the Mediterranean when he was interrupted by the far-right deputy.
“Let them go back to Africa!” exclaimed De Fournas, according to his version of events. The deputies of La Francia Insumisa, on the other hand, believed that he used the phrase in the singular to insult Carlos Martens Bilongo, a Frenchman of African descent. In French, both sentences sound almost identical.
The far-right deputy maintains that he was referring to the immigrant boat and not to his colleague. After the commotion these statements caused in the meeting room, the Speaker of the National Assembly adjourned the session.
“I am totally innocent of the charges against me,” the deputy for National Regrouping, Marine Le Pen’s party, tweeted after the sanction. Although De Fournas believed his sanction was “incredibly harsh” and “a grave injustice”, he announced that he would abide by the decision out of respect for the National Assembly.
Bilongo, for his part, was “relieved” after the far-right deputy’s approval. “I was always convinced that the National Regrouping Group was racist and this confirms it,” added the deputy of La Francia Insumisa, the equivalent of Podemos in France.
Far-right leader Marine Le Pen regretted that her party’s deputy had been sanctioned for his “political ideas”. “This is a political process that condemns a political idea: the idea that NGO ships should not deposit immigrants in Europe, but in the ports of origin,” tweeted Le Pen, who believes that “this process is contrary to democracy and freedom of expression”.
The controversy erupted on the eve of the National Regrouping Congress. Le Pen, who has since taken the reins of the party, has sought to ‘de-diabolize’ it and make it more presentable to the electorate, this Saturday will hand over the party chairmanship to one of two candidates for the position: MEP Jordan Bardella or the mayor of Perpignan, Louis Aliot. For the first time in its 50-year history, the National Realignment (former National Front) will have a president who will not be nicknamed Le Pen.
Source: La Verdad
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