France marks its eighth annual slavery Remembrance Day on Saturday, an event that has already sparked a heated debate which is threatening to derail the planned commemorations, reports FRANCE 24.
The day, which was first introduced in 2006, is celebrated annually on May 10 – the same date France adopted a law in 2001 officially recognising the slave trade and slavery as crimes against humanity.
Events are scheduled to be held across the country, but a handful of right-wing politicians have already threatened to mar the commemoration, equating the day to a form of “self-flagellation”.
Earlier this week, Thierry Mariani, a member of parliament from France’s conservative UMP party, caused outrage after tweeting that the recent kidnapping of more than 200 schoolgirls in Nigeria was “a reminder that Africa did not wait for the West to practice slavery”. He concluded his post with the hashtag #décupabilisation, which translates to “guilt free”.
“We’ve had enough of hearing about the West’s monopoly on guilt,” Mariani explained to French radio station France Info. “We must stop writing a one-sided account of history”.
France’s National Committee for the Remembrance and History of Slavery declared that it was “scandalised” by Mariani’s comments. It argued that slavery was once again being used as “a tool to set ‘Whites’ against ‘Blacks’ and ran counter to the principals of the French Republic.”
The controversial statement by Mariani is not an isolated case. In April, Franck Briffaut, the newly-elected National Front mayor of Villers-Cotterêts, in Picardy, made clear he would not organise any events on May 10.
Read more of this report from FRANCE 24.