The political class was quick to react. The Franco-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal, missing since his landing in Algiers last Saturday, was reportedly arrested by local security forces according to information from Marianne. Emmanuel Macron's entourage, but also other major political figures, expressed their deep concern on Thursday evening.
The head of state said he was “very concerned about the disappearance” of the novelist, his entourage indicates. Emmanuel Macron naturalized Boualem Sansal in person this year. “State services are mobilized to clarify his situation,” it was specified, adding that “the President of the Republic expresses his unwavering attachment to the freedom of a great writer and intellectual.”
Several French political leaders, especially belonging to the right and center-right, have also expressed their concern and support for the writer, known for his freedom of thought, whether against the Algerian power or religious fundamentalism, since that he launched into literature in 1999.
A “freedom fighter and courageous opponent of Islamism”, according to Le Pen
“He embodies everything we cherish: the call for reason, freedom and humanism against censorship, corruption and Islamism,” launched former Prime Minister Edouard Philippe on X, in calling on “French and European authorities to obtain precise information and ensure that he can move freely and return to France whenever he wishes”.
“All means of pressure on Algeria must be activated to obtain the release of our compatriot, the great writer Boualem Sansal,” added the leader of the LR deputies (Republicans, right) Laurent Wauquiez. The leader of the deputies of the National Rally (RN) Marine Le Pen, for her part, asked the French government “to act to obtain his immediate release”, hailing Boualem Sansal as a “freedom fighter and courageous opponent of Islamism.”
Boualem Sansal found success from the outset with “The Oath of the Barbarians”, a novel recounting the rise of fundamentalists who contributed to plunging his country into a civil war that left at least 200,000 dead between 1992 and 2002. His books, published in France, are sold freely in Algeria but the author is controversial there, particularly since a visit to Israel in 2014.
“I very much hope that my friend Boualem will return to us very soon”
Another Franco-Algerian writer, Kamel Daoud, Goncourt 2024 for “Houris”, is at the heart of a controversy in Algeria, accused by a victim of the civil war of having exploited his story. “Kamel Daoud is the subject of violent defamatory campaigns orchestrated by certain media close to a regime whose nature no one is ignorant of,” denounced Monday the director of his publishing house, Gallimard, who was banned from participate in the Algiers International Book Fair.
Kamel Daoud took up his pen Thursday evening in Le Figaro. “I very much hope that my friend Boualem will return among us very soon,” he said in a forum, while confiding his incomprehension in the face of the “recklessness” which, according to him, Boualem Sansal would have shown in going to Algeria.
