• On May 18, a video was filmed by a passer-by during a bachelor party, organized in a restaurant in Poitiers, where one of the participants had her face painted black.

  • Some participants were in training to become municipal police officers.

    Their internship was suspended after the broadcast of this video.

  • The restaurateur considers himself the victim of a wave of accusations of racism and promotion of "blackface" since the broadcast of the video.

    He filed a complaint for death threats, defamation and cyberbullying.

The video is very bad.

Municipal police officers were suspended from their training course a month after the publication of a video where one of these trainees can be seen dancing on the terrace of a restaurant in Poitiers, her face made up in black, indicated Saturday the National Center for the Territorial Public Service (CNFPT) to an AFP correspondent.

According to the restaurateur, some participants in the evening were part of "a promotion of the municipal police" in training at the CNFPT in Poitiers.

"They all said, 'you shouldn't say it was us,'" Michaël Taylor told RMC info on Thursday.

Training suspended

Questioned by an AFP correspondent, the management of the establishment condemned the attitude of the trainees and indicated that they had temporarily suspended their training.

A letter was also sent to the communities that employ them during their internship to inform them of these actions.

"It is then up to the local authorities whether or not to establish these civil servants", declared Didier Mercier-Lachapelle, director of the New Aquitaine delegation of the CNFPT on France Bleu Poitou radio, adding for his part that there is no would have no further sanction.

This video of a few seconds filmed by a passerby during a costume party for a bachelorette party on May 18 and then posted on social networks shows a white woman wearing an Afro wig, her face made up in black, dancing stereotypically on the restaurant terrace.

Since its publication, restaurateur Michaël Taylor claims to have suffered on social networks a wave of accusations of racism and promotion of “blackface” – a practice which consists in blackening the face in order to make fun of black people.

He says he lost “80% of his turnover” and received insults and death threats.

This week, SOS racism supported him, his local manager Cheikh Diaby, assuring him that he was “a collateral victim.

“It is the person who is doing the” “blackface” who has caused trouble,” Cheikh Diaby told an AFP correspondent on Thursday.

The "blackface" is a "practice constituting a racist crime" "born in the United States during the slavery period", which many restaurateurs are unaware of, according to Mr. Diaby.

The restaurateur who works with his mother said he filed a complaint for death threats, defamation and cyberbullying.

Culture

Accused of having published a "blackface" on Instagram, Gérard Darmon creates indignation

Media

Blackface: The Belgian magazine "Le Vif" justifies its controversy and apologizes

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  • Police

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