Tuesday January 7, the founder of the National Front, Jean-Marie-Le Pen, died at the age of 96. Anyone who liked to be called the Menhir will have led a very long political career on the far right. For nearly 70 years, Africa was above all an obsession for him, that of immigration that he hated. A look back at Jean-Marie Le Pen’s links with the continent and its leaders.
The story of Jean-Marie Le Pen with the continent began in the mid-1950s. Barely elected deputy, he left at the age of 27 to fight in Algeria against the independence of the country. Accused of torture, he would later deny these accusations without denying this type of practice: “ If harsh interrogation methods were used, it was an absolute necessity, because it was necessary to find the bombs which, I remind you, killed people and injured people and tortured people. »
Son engagement en Algeria will remain a marker for Jean-Marie Le Pen. It was also with supporters of French Algeria that he created the National Front in 1972. The FN and Le Pen have an obsession, immigration, particularly that from Africa. A subject that they manage to bring to the fore in the French political debate. To do this, the tribune multiplies the provocations and racist outings. Outings which earned him numerous condemnations. As in 1998 for his comments made two years earlier: “ I believe in racial inequality. Yes, of course, it’s obvious. All history demonstrates this. They do not have the same capacity nor the same level of historical evolution “, he declared.
A strong rejection on the continent
Statements and positioning that provoke a strong rejection of him on the continent. Especially since Jean-Marie Le Pen has never hidden his admiration for the policy of apartheid practiced in South Africa. A digression all the same: in 1987, Jean-Marie Le Pen was received by the Gabonese president Omar Bongo. Problem is, he will be suspected of having received, like the other leaders of the major French political parties, money from Libreville: “ I also visited Mr. Bongo, but I visited the king of Morocco, Mr. Houphouët-Boigny, and the officials of Congo-Kinshasa. I met President Reagan. None of these people ever gave me money », affirmed Jean-Marie Le Pen.
In the end, it was only with Jean-Bedel Bokassa that Jean-Marie Le Pen maintained a semblance of a relationship. The deposed Central African emperor whom he met in France in the early 1980s. The two men had a common past, the Indochina war within the French army.
Also readJean-Marie Le Pen, historic figure of the French far right, has died at the age of 96
