BERTRAND GUAY / AFP
In the columns of Paris-Match magazine, the Minister of the Civil Service revealed a lot of information about his private life, in the interest of transparency with the French.
POLITICS – The science of timing. As thousands of civil servants prepare to demonstrate in France on Thursday, November 5, the minister on whom they depend, Guillaume Kasbarian, made an unexpected announcement on Tuesday, December 3, to say the least. By revealing his homosexuality in broad daylight in the columns of Paris-Match.
A coming out which makes the current Minister of the Civil Service the first full-time minister to publicly present his companion, named Antoine. A former military pilot with whom he has been in a civil partnership for three years now.
Speaking to the magazine, Guillaume Kasbarian also took the opportunity to explain the reasons for this revelation in a delicate moment for the executive, between a motion of censure on the Social Security budget which could already oust Michel Barnier from Matignon and the start of a standoff with civil servants, with whom dialogue seems broken after unsuccessful negotiations in recent weeks.
« I do it because I want to be sincere with the French people who follow me. I also want to show them that I live a life that is perfectly banal, normal. In the countryside, in a small rural village, like millions of French people “, he explained in a video which accompanies the article of Paris-Match.
« I want to tell them that there is no subject and that what is important is to feel free and to live life with whoever you want, adds the former Minister Delegate in charge of Housing. If it doesn't provoke any reactions, if there are no comments, then the game is won. »
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« That means we've reached the stage where I don't care who I live with. Is he a man? Is she a woman? If, conversely, we realize that there are lots of derogatory comments, lots of value judgments, lots of moral lessons (…) that means there is still a way to go “, he says.
Pilot for government planes
Aged 37, government minister Barnier also specifies that “ there is no ulterior motive, no particular communication » behind this private announcement.
Concerning his companion, the minister agreed to reveal part of his life. Now a pilot with Air France, he spent two decades in the French army, notably carrying out operations in Mali and Niger. But since 2015, the pilot has joined the Villacoublay squadron, specialized in piloting government planes used by French heads of state.
“I did not agree to do it in a militant approach, our objective with Antoine has always been to be equal”further specifies Guillaume Kasbarian, while his companion admits to appearing publicly for the first time. An exercise with which he confides that he is not very comfortable, preferring to live “ in the most banal, natural way possible. And therefore far from the current tumult in the National Assembly.
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