It is an extremely rare scene that took place this Thursday afternoon at the National Assembly.
A mass of elected officials gathered at the foot of President Yaël Braun-Pivet's perch to ask her to account for the incident that has just occurred.
A few minutes earlier, the RN deputy for the 5th constituency of Gironde Grégoire de Fournas was accused of having made racist remarks.
His rebellious colleague Carlos Martens Bilongo, during questions to the government, challenged the executive on the situation of the ship Ocean Viking, stranded for 13 days in the Mediterranean with 234 migrants on board.
This is where the interpretations diverge.
For the rebellious, the elected would have invited his rebellious colleague to return to Africa.
Grégoire de Fournas, for his part, assures us that he was talking about the boat on which the migrants are.
Boat which, let us remember, did not come from Africa but rescued migrants.
The RN has never been so well represented in the office of the Assembly
Faced with this controversy, the President of the National Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet reacted quickly.
She quickly interrupted the session after noting that no RN deputy designated himself as the author of the alleged remarks.
Then, in front of the journalists, she evoked the follow-up which will be given to this affair.
“The remarks made earlier in the hemicycle are extremely serious remarks (…) The question will be raised in the office of the AN”.
This meeting will take place on Friday at 2:30 p.m.
This office of the National Assembly risks being electric.
Because if Yaël Braun-Pivet confided that he heard Grégoire de Fournas say “Go back to Africa” at the time, it is obvious that this will not be the case for the elected RN members of this office.
Recall that out of six vice-presidential positions, the RN obtained two at the start of the legislature.
The group chaired by Marine Le Pen has never been so well represented in the upper echelons of the National Assembly.
What fault could be held under the rules?
If the office of the Assembly has been seized, it is because the president opens the way to the heaviest sanctions in the event that the fault of the deputy of Gironde is recognized.
The office is indeed the only body empowered "to pronounce more serious sanctions than the call to order or the call to order with entry in the minutes", recalled this Thursday Yaël Braun-Pivet.
Questioned by us, the services of the Assembly drew up a list of possible sanctions, as provided for by the regulations of the National Assembly.
"The disciplinary regime and the sanctions applicable to deputies, if any, are provided for by articles 70 to 80-6 of the Rules of Procedure of the National Assembly", we are told.
In detail, article 70 establishes the list of behaviors likely to be sanctioned.
Among them, the fact for an elected official to engage “in a personal questioning, which challenges another deputy or who addresses one or more of his colleagues with insults, provocations or threats”, can we read in the regulations.
What possible penalties?
In the event that this fault is retained, the regulations of the National Assembly provide for a range of possible sanctions.
In addition to the calls to order mentioned above, the office may propose to the National Assembly simple censure or censure with temporary exclusion.
The latter is the heaviest sanction, and it is the one that is explicitly requested by the rebellious deputies.
Simple censure entails by right the deprivation, for one month, of half of the parliamentary indemnity allocated to the deputy.
Censorship with temporary exclusion automatically entails the deprivation, for two months, of half of the parliamentary indemnity allocated to the deputy.
It also entails a ban on taking part in the work of the Assembly and on reappearing in the Palace of the Assembly until the expiration of the fifteenth sitting day following that on which the sentence was pronounced.
This period increases to thirty days in the event of a second sanction.
If the censure were to be retained by the office, the sanction would have to be adopted by the deputies.
A vote would then be organized within the hemicycle.
The deputies should then vote according to the mode of "seated - raised".
When a penalty other than a simple call to order is proposed, “the Bureau shall hear the MP concerned or, at the request of the latter, one of his colleagues on his behalf”, further provides for the rules.
This range of sanctions obviously only applies to the parliamentary framework.
If it were proven that Grégoire de Fournas made racist remarks, he could perfectly well be prosecuted in the field of criminal law.