The instruction came from the highest summit in the state on Sunday evening: “The Republic will not erase any trace or any name from its history. The Republic will not unbolt a statue. Rather, we must lucidly look together at our memories, our relationship to Africa in particular, ”planted Emmanuel Macron in an address followed by 23.6 million viewers. Manner of putting the points on the i, whereas the American riots after the death of George Floyd made revive in France the debate on the colonial past and some of its contested historical figures. In particular that of Colbert, at the initiative in 1685 of the Black Code.
But will a presidential update be enough to calm the heated debates of the past few days? “You can never close history. It is not possible. It will continue to be written. And if the question of the colonial past and slavery is brought to the agenda, it will not disappear as if by magic. Now the subject is what do we do? What do we write, especially around these statues that some people want to unbolt? ” wonders Benjamin Stora.
VIDEO. Macron: no statue will be "unbolted"
While his counterpart Jean Garrigues also believes that "the chapter is not over", arguing for the need for a "presidential speech that tries to take stock of slavery, a form of national repentance that makes the update on this period in our history ”.
Macron tempted to "send a strong signal"
The task is not easy. Emmanuel Macron is aware of this, especially in a society so fractured on these issues. In recent days, the head of state has also summoned his teams to work on it. "And when he asks for that, it means that he expects quick and tangible results," said a counselor, who spoke of "the will to overcome this trauma linked to the colonial question". In this spirit, an initiative linked to France's African policy would be under consideration, a priori around the cultural event Africa 2020, postponed to 2021 because of the Covid-19 crisis.
The Elysée is also looking into the sixtieth anniversary of the Evian agreements, ending the Algerian war, which will take place in 2022, and on which Emmanuel Macron could be tempted to "send a strong signal", tells us -we. In the same spirit as his declarations of February 2017, when then a presidential candidate, he declared during a trip to Algeria that colonization "is a crime against humanity. A real barbarism ”. "Recognizing the mistakes of the past, the crimes of the past, is what Jacques Chirac understood in 1995 with the Vel d'Hiv roundup," notes Jean Garrigues. According to our information, Emmanuel Macron also plans to pay tribute next September to Félix Eboué, hero of the Resistance and of Gaullism, a great figure in the colonial administration and the first black man to rest in the Pantheon.
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“France is the country of controversies and controversies. But when the president says that we will not unbolt the statues, that means that we will not impose on each citizen a way of considering History by giving elements of reinterpretation, slips a close to the head of state . The worst would even be to give the feeling of infantilizing the French. "
