Japanese video game publisher Konami decided, Wednesday, July 7, to end his contract with French striker Antoine Griezmann, following the broadcast of a video deemed racist that recently surfaced on the Web.
Indeed, in this video published on July 2 on an almost anonymous YouTube account (25 subscribers), we see Dembélé questioning his teammate Griezmann while technicians are busy in a hotel room during a tour in 2019 with their club, FC Barcelona.
"Dembouz '" is ironic about their physique and their language under the gaze of his partner amused but silent.
"We have decided to cancel the contract"
Become Konami ambassador in June, Griezmann will only have remained under contract with the Japanese publisher for one month:
"We had announced that Antoine Griezmann would be our Yu-Gi-Oh! Ambassador, but in light of recent events, we have decided to cancel the contract," the company said in a statement.
Konami, which annually publishes the console football game Pro Evolution Soccer (PES), also asked FC Barcelona "to explain the details of this case and future actions."
The Japanese company justified its decision by explaining that "discrimination in all its forms is unacceptable".
"I was not targeting any community"
The two players apologized on Sunday on their respective social networks.
"I have always been committed against any form of discrimination (...) I firmly refute the accusations made to me and I am sorry if I could offend my Japanese friends," said Antoine Griezmann.
I have always been committed against any form of discrimination.
For the past few days, some people have wanted to pass me off as the man I am not.
I firmly refute the accusations made against me and I am sorry if I could offend my Japanese friends.
- Antoine Griezmann (@AntoGriezmann) July 5, 2021
His teammate in Barcelona and in the France team assured his side that he "would have used the same expressions" anywhere on the planet.
"So I was not targeting any community," he said.
The controversy could have serious consequences since Tuesday, Hiroshi Mikitani, the CEO of the Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten, and sponsor of FC Barcelona, said he wanted "an explanation" and let it be known on the social network Twitter that he would "officially protest to the club".
[# Declared] Hiroshi Mikitani, the CEO of Rakuten, did not like the video of Griezmann and Dembélé at all!
Rakuten is one of Barça's main partners.
pic.twitter.com/EHfTvvVHlE
- Footballogue⭐️⭐️ (@Footballogue) July 6, 2021
The pressure from sponsor Rakuten, who pays 55 million euros a year to be on the FC Barcelona shirt, could darken the player's future at FC Barcelona.
Rakuten has also demanded a public apology from the two players.
FC Barcelona have also issued a statement in English and Japanese in which they "publicly apologize" and say "deeply regret" the "lack of respect" of their two players.
"This attitude does not coincide with the values that FC Barcelona represents and defends," added the Blaugrana club.
A "blackface" in 2017
Antoine Griezmann is a player who likes to get involved in causes. In December 2020, the French attacker decided to break off his partnership with Chinese Huawei, citing "strong suspicions" about his participation in the monitoring of the Uyghur Muslim minority by the Chinese authorities, which the company denies. Likewise, the Barcelonan had also denounced at the end of 2020, the assault of a black music producer by the police in Paris.
However, the Frenchman has already experienced a racist controversy.
In 2017, he had to apologize after posting on social networks, a photo of him, made up as a black player of the Harlem Globetrotters.
A tribute for him but a gesture denounced as a "blackface", which refers to a racist practice born at the time of segregation in the United States.
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