Europe, Headlines, Human Rights, Press Freedom

FRANCE: ‘Excited Little Boy’ Takes Hold of the Media

Julio Godoy

PARIS, Jul 23 2008 (IPS) - The media in France, already in a heavy financial and credibility crisis, did not need yet another blow. But that is just what it got in President Nicolas Sarkozy’s announcement that he will personally pick the directors of the public television and radio broadcasting companies.

Sarkozy has announced also that these companies will have to stop advertisements after 8pm, and that these will be phased out altogether by 2012. This will lead to a loss of more than a billion dollars a year in revenue – and that much more reliance on a licence fee processed by the government.

Sarkozy said “the main share owner (of public television and radio) will name the director.” That means, of course, the state. So far directors have been appointed by parliament on the recommendation of an independent council of audiovisual affairs.

Sarkozy defended these changes because he said “the national public networks resemble too much the private television channels.”

Patrick de Carolis, CEO of the public television network France Télévisions, said Sarkozy’s comment that its programmes resemble private networks too closely is “false, stupid, and deeply unjust.”

Journalists and analysts say Sarkozy is only strengthening his influence on the French press, most of which is already controlled by a handful of his friends.

“Bernard Arnault owns (the financial newspaper) Les Echos, Arnaud Lagardère the (Sunday newspaper) Journal du Dimanche, the weekly Paris Match, and is an important shareowner of Le Monde, Vincent Bolloré owns free daily newspapers Direct 8 and Metro, and Serge Dassault has Le Figaro,” Isabelle Roberts, correspondent with the daily Libération told IPS.

Martin Bouygues, who is close to Sarkozy, owns the television company TF1. TF1 is the leader in the country, followed by the national public broadcasting network France 2. The TF1 will be the main beneficiary of an end to advertising on public television channels.

Sarkozy has said he speaks at least once a day with Martin Bouygues, Vincent Bolloré, Serge Dassault, and Arnaud Lagardére.

Sarkozy has used his relations with these owners to control the media. In the summer of 2005, Alain Genestar, then editor of Paris Match, was dismissed without explanation. Genestar said Sarkozy had asked owner Arnaud Lagardére to fire him for publishing photographs showing Sarkozy’s former wife Cécilia with her then lover and now husband Richard Attias. Sarkozy and Cécilia divorced late last year. He married pop singer and former model Carla Bruni, and Cécilia married Attias.

Patrick Poivre d’Arvor, TF1 news anchor since 1987, was sacked last June, also without explanation. He said the reason for his dismissal was that he called Sarkozy “an excited little boy” in an interview with him last year. Poivre d’Arvor had been referring to Sarkozy’s erratic behaviour at a press conference a couple of weeks earlier.

In the course of an interview with Sarkozy last year, Poivre d’Arvor said he had actually complimented him by calling him “an excited little boy.”

Roberts says many people close to Sarkozy now occupy leading positions in newsrooms.

“Laurent Solly, former director of Sarkozy’s election campaign is now director of TF1,” says Roberts. “Another friend of Sarkozy’s, Jean-Claude Dassier, is director of information at the same channel.”

On Jul. 3, Christine Ockrent, wife of foreign minister Bernard Kouchner, was appointed deputy director of Radio France International.

Sarkozy’s government has been accused also of trying to set coverage to benefit his friends’ companies. In a recent case, the government was blamed for pushing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to give an interview to TF1 instead of the public television France 2. According to Le Canard Enchaîne newspaper, this was after France 2 had already fixed an interview with Assad.