The news unleashed the indignation of the left and the presidential majority. Following the decision of the National Assembly office in early December, the National Grouping (RN) could chair the study groups on combating anti-Semitism and HIV at the Palais Bourbon.
These study groups are cross-party structures, “irreplaceable places for discussion and exchange” that allow deputies to deepen and follow specific issues”, ensuring in particular “legal and technical surveillance”, summarizes the National Assembly.
However, the legitimacy of the calling party to seize these issues is disputed, due to the history of the movement. Jean-Marie Le Pen, co-founder of the National Front (FN), which became a National Grouping in 2018, was sentenced, for example, for “incitement to hatred”, “disputing a crime against humanity” or even “public racial insult”. “. “.
Many still remember his 1987 outing, when he claimed that the gas chambers were a “point of detail in the history of World War II.”
“serophobic” outlets
If it was above all the arrival of the RN at the head of the group on anti-Semitism that was the subject of debate this Wednesday, the environmentalist deputy Sandrine Rousseau nevertheless recalled the positions of Jean-Marie Le Pen on AIDS, indicating that the latter “he spoke of putting the ‘siadaïques’ in ‘(sidatoria)'”.
AIDES, the main association in the fight against AIDS, has collected numerous interventions on its website by leaders from the extreme right to denounce the “violence” of their speech “against HIV-positive people”.
Postures dating from the FN and the “serophobic” era “still find today very painful extensions in the party led by (…) Marine Le Pen”, writes the association.
“Sidaiques” and “sidatoria”
To remember these positions on the disease denounced by AIDES, we must look back in time. On May 6, 1987, Jean-Marie Le Pen was invited to The moment of truth. The president of the National Front describes people with AIDS as “aids.” “A neologism that is not very pretty”, concedes the far-right before developing:
“The AIDS patient is contagious through his perspiration, his tears, his saliva, his contact. He is a kind of leper if you will.”
Jean-Marie Le Pen advocates the creation of “sidatorio”. Which would be “specialized center(s) with strict hygiene standards,” he specifies.
For the FN, AIDS is equivalent to “Socialism Immigration Drug Trafficking”
In March 1990, Jean-Marie Le Pen declared:
“The path of decline that France has embarked on (…) can be summed up in a formula that would be that of political AIDS, whose initials would mean socialism, immigration, drugs and business.”
This slogan is found on the posters of the National Rally where a resumption of the Socialist Party logo also appears, with, instead of the rose, a ball of spades.
Jean-Marie Le Pen explains his strategy to the National Assembly on December 7, 1990. “Burning campaigns based on the AIDS sign will be carried out everywhere,” he said.
“These acronyms stand for: S for Socialists, Wasters, and Destroyers, I for Third World Immigration, D for Crime, Disorder, Decadence, A for Business, because political and financial scandals have become the shameful bread of the system.”
The case ends up in court. On May 23, 1991, the Court of Lyon banned this poster and condemned this slogan. According to the judges, “the use of the term AIDS to stigmatize immigration, which would represent a danger as serious as the disease, intolerably undermines the dignity of the sick.” The latter “have the right to respect and solidarity.” Furthermore, it is an “intolerable attack on the dignity of immigrant populations.”
When Marine Le Pen blamed socialism for “500,000 HIV positive”
During the 1993 legislative elections, Marine Le Pen was a candidate for the FN in the 16th arrondissement of Paris (17th arrondissement). Her campaign poster reads “SOCIALISM ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.”
Several figures are then attributed to the festival of the rose, among them that of “500,000 seropositive”. Inaccurate data according to Aides. “The highest estimates have never exceeded 200,000 people,” says the association.
“Words of Thirty and Forty Years”
Contacted by BFMTV.com, Sébastien Chenu, vice president of the National Assembly and head of the study groups, points out “comments from people aged 30-40” to whom “he does not feel obligated”. “I don’t support them,” he says.
The far-right elected denounces “political instrumentalization” and highlights “the transpartisan groups made up of elected officials from all sides.”
“People believe that elected officials are not legitimate to deal with certain issues, they are wrong,” he defends. “Prosecuting legitimate elected officials, since they were chosen by the French people, is not my conception of democracy.”
Source: BFM TV
