Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire categorically rejected Monday's proposal by former Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault to rename the Bercy building, which bears the name of Jean-Baptiste Colbert.
"It will continue to be called the Colbert building," said the minister on France Info, when asked about Jean-Marc Ayrault's proposal to rename a Colbert room at the National Assembly, as well as the Bercy building which houses the hotel. ministers. Minister of Louis XIV, Colbert is to be considered as the initiative in 1685 of the Black Code, which legislated slavery in the French colonies.
The Minister recalled that Colbert died in 1683, two years before the publication of the Code noir. "It was not he who wrote it. It happens at the very end of his life, "he said.
New memory controversy
In the wake of anti-racist American demonstrations, the monuments and statues linked to French colonial history or the slave trade are once again at the center of a memorial controversy. "We will not unbolt the statues as the President of the Republic said and we will not rename the official buildings", continued Bruno Le Maire, in allusion to the declaration of the day before Emmanuel Macron.
"Regarding Colbert, I readily admit that he is not a very nice character," he said. But Colbert, "it is the Compagnie des Indes, the restructuring of industry, the manufacture of the Gobelins, the rehabilitation of Finances", he recalled. "I remember this great year in the history of France, which is the year 1661. Mazarin dies and he says to the king:" Sire, I owe you everything, but I think I am discharging him with his Majesty leaving Colbert, "said the current Minister of Finance.
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- Bruno Le Maire
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