French Minister of Interior accused of racism

PARIS - Brice Hortefeux, French Minister of Interior and close to President Nicolas Sarkozy, was found Friday in the heart of a political storm, called for the resignation after the broadcast on Internet of a video in which he makes racist comments.

•     The spokesman Benoit Hamon from the Socialist Party has said that these statements were "despicable". "Many Socialists voices have called for the immediate resignation of Brice Hortefeux," he said on the channel i-Tele.
  
      On the video made of September 5 at the UMP party (right, in power) summer university and broadcasted on the internet, Brice Hortefeux says that "it is when there are many that there are problems", apparently speaking about immigrants.
  
      The case is particularly inappropriate for the Minister that he has recently sanctioned a prefect, made Wednesday at compulsory retirement because he was accused of racism.
  
      "I say to myself that the most racist of us, is not me," also responded Friday officer, Paul Girot de Langlade, under a judicial investigation for "public insults of a racial nature."
  
      The Socialist leader Martine Aubry asked the minister to apply the "same rule", i.e. the departure from the government. "We must apply to ourselves what is done to others: suspension and retirement from Office", agreed the former Socialist candidate for president, Ségolène Royal.
  
      A Green Senator, Alima Boumediene-Thiery, said she was "outraged by the properly racist comments of Brice Hortefeux " and called for "immediate removal from the government."
  
      As for associations, the Movement against Racism and for Friendship between Peoples (MRAP) was "astonished but not surprised by the racist statement" of Brice Hortefeux. SOS Racisme expressed "dismay" and asked the minister to "publicly explain."
  
      On the other hand, the majority of the right held a response for the defense of the minister, among the faithful followers of Nicolas Sarkozy.
  
      The Prime Minister Francois Fillon said Thursday evening that his interior minister was "the victim of a smear campaign rather scandalous". The Health Minister Roselyne Bachelot said she was "disgusted by an absolutely miserable media trial," while his colleague of Education, Luc Chatel regretted "a ridiculous polemic."
  
      Being in the centre of a controversy, the young UMP activists of North African origin who appears on video, Amine, declared that the sentences of the minister had been "entirely out of context". Brice Hortefeux, himself, said he was not talking about immigrants, but about the Auvergne, the region where he is elected.
  
      On the video, aired Thursday on the Website of Le Monde, one can see and hear a militant from the UMP party declare about Amin: "He eats pork, he drinks beer."
  
      While posing for a photo with the young man, Brice Hortefeux continued: "He does not correspond at all to the prototype. It is always one. When there was one it’s okay. It is when there are many that there are problems."
  
     colleague of Brice Hortefeux in a former French government, Azzouz Begag, of Algerian origin, said he was not surprised. "he's a real good skid of a racist franchouillard which is not surprising coming from a minister who leads a xenophobic policy," he said.
  
      Brice Hortefeux was, from May 2007 to January 2009, the Minister of Immigration and National Identity of Nicolas Sarkozy, to conduct a more strict immigration policy than before.
  
      
  Ennaharonline/ M. O.