Legend has it that de Gaulle himself sounded the call to decency. When Georges Pompidou was preparing to join the Elysée, the general is said to have suggested to his former prime minister, who used to relax in Saint-Tropez (Var), to opt for a destination less “glitter”. “Brittany! » would have advised de Gaulle to him. Real or fantasized, the anecdote recalls the strength of symbols. And the exemplarity to which the executive is bound.
A little less than a hundred days before the presidential election, in a country jostled by an interminable health crisis, any lack of taste seems difficult to forgive. The revelation, Monday, January 17, by the site Mediapart of the stay spent at the end of 2021 by the Minister of Education, Jean-Michel Blanquer, in Ibiza, a small Balearic island known for its unbridled nightlife, inevitably caused a wave of indignation within the political class.
It was under the mockery of the right that the minister, yesterday appreciated by the conservatives, made his entry into the National Assembly on Tuesday to answer questions to the government. “So the DJ? » “We are better off in Ibiza! » we heard on the benches of the Hemicycle. So yes, there was awkwardness, conceded the minister. “There is, I recognize, a symbolism (…), the symbolism, I regret it », admitted Mr. Blanquer.
Calls for the resignation on the left
The tenant of the rue de Grenelle is not at his first mea culpa. Four days earlier, he had admitted on Franceinfo ” errors “ linked to the health protocol which had caused chaos in the schools. The minister had been heckled on January 3 for having announced this protocol a few hours before the start of the school year in an interview with the Parisian. Expressing oneself through the press via an article – at first paid for – without anticipation gave the feeling of a lack of consideration for education professionals.
Knowing today that this interview was granted by telephone, from Ibiza, and not face-to-face, as the photo of Mr. Blanquer, in front of his office, which appeared in the newspaper, might lead one to believe, takes on the appearance of deception. The editorial director of Parisian-Today in France, Jean-Michel Salvator, regretted on Tuesday a « imprudence », while the editorial staff denied having sought to cover up the minister.
Nevertheless, the “Ibiza affair” reinforces the image of a foreign minister to the anxieties of teachers and the exasperation of parents. “The problem is not Ibiza, it is the dilettantism of this minister”, estimated Tuesday, on France 2, the environmental candidate for the presidential election, Yannick Jadot, while the left called for his resignation.
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