Paris (AFP)

"Listen", rather than "be silent", before "speaking": Audrey Pulvar corrected the point Tuesday after his remarks on the single-sex meetings which earned him attacks from the right and the far right , but also disapproval on the left.

The candidate invested by the PS in regional in Ile-de-France, with the support of the mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo of whom she is deputy, had estimated Saturday, about "single-sex" meetings for people considering themselves victims of racism, that a white person should not be excluded but that he "can be asked to be silent".

"I mentioned the possibility that other activists or citizens who are not victims of racism participate, without difficulty, but on the condition (...) of being first of all in a benevolent listening to the words of the people discriminated against, "writes Audrey Pulvar Tuesday in a column published in Le Monde.

"I used the verb + to be silent +, because that is generally what we do, when we really want to listen to the other, before then taking the floor," says the candidate again, according to which "of some saw it as a form of summons to silence. Wrongly. "

"To those whom my formulation may have offended, by giving them the feeling that I wanted to exclude them from the start, I mean here that such was neither my words nor my intention", pleads the deputy to the sustainable food at the Paris town hall.

"I never said I wanted to silence part of the population, for any reason whatsoever, and even less for their skin color. I never uttered or conceived the words + the whites must be silent + (...) ", insists the former journalist, of Martinican origin.

The president of the UNEF, Mélanie Luce, mentioned last week the organization of "single-sex" meetings to "allow people affected by racism to be able to express what they are undergoing".

If "these groups did not have my preference", indicates Audrey Pulvar, "I can conceive, hear, the need for discriminated people (...) to find themselves + among themselves +, to exchange, to reassure themselves, to find together the means to protect oneself from other abuses ".

- The left embarrassed -

Before this update, the sentence pronounced Saturday on BFMTV had earned Audrey Pulvar many criticisms, after a campaign start marked by accusations of child criminality targeting her father who died in 2008.

Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said Tuesday morning he was "deeply shocked" by Ms. Pulvar's statements, according to him "contrary to the republican pact", and asked him to "correct his remarks".

For Valérie Pécresse, president (Libres!) Of Ile-de-France, "there is no + acceptable + racism".

And the president of RN Marine Le Pen demanded against Ms. Pulvar "prosecution for incitement to racial discrimination".

On the left, while the first secretary of the PS Olivier Faure on Tuesday renewed his support for Audrey Pulvar for the regional, while considering that she had uttered "an unhappy sentence", the most assertive marks of support came from France Insubordinate.

The Greens kept their distance, Eric Piolle calling on the left "not to be drawn into a debate in which no one will be the winner", while Yannick Jadot considered Audrey Pulvar's expression "very awkward".

PCF boss Fabien Roussel clearly rejected "meetings segmented according to the color of his skin, his religion or his sex" which "divide the fight".

© 2021 AFP