BLOG: Marine Le Pen’s visit to Canada last weekend has been described by the gloating French press as a near-fiasco, a disaster. But who is responsible for the “fiasco”? Marine or the Canadians themselves who greeted her as if she were a bloodthirsty serial killer, when in truth, she brought her usual message of the need for immigration restriction, tightly controlled borders, her criticism of the powers-that-be both in France and Canada, and in the case of Quebec, a demand for greater interest in the French language. Canadians were offended by her criticisms and banned her everywhere as if she were the ebola virus.
Her own camp is blaming her for the disaster, saying the trip had not been properly planned.
I say the Canadians, French and otherwise, are crazy.
Here’s a summary from Le Figaro, dated March 22, slightly abridged. It appears to have been written just before the Brussels attacks since they are not mentioned:
It was meant to be an escapade across the Atlantic far from the media. Anxious to distance herself from the French media, that she blames for part of her image problems with the foreign press, Marine Le Pen was nonetheless not welcome in Canada where she had intended to spend six days boosting her international stature. Shunned by local leaders who would not meet with her, she attracted the lightening bolts of Canadian public opinion when she attacked Ottawa for its policy on migrants. Worse: hounded by groups of activists hostile to the extreme right, Marine Le Pen saw her hotel reservations summarily cancelled in Quebec.
No sooner had she arrived than a group of anti-fascists and radical leftists prepared a welcoming committee. A tense atmosphere set the tone for the whole visit. According to several Canadian media, no political representative agreed to interview the presidential candidate, despite the schedule announced by the Front National. “She would have liked to discuss immigration with Quebecer politicians. But the majority of them refused to meet her,” wrote Radio Canada on Saturday. Same refusal from the cabinet of Prime minister Couillard. The Coalition Avenir Québec, a center-right party, also declined the invitation.
Even when a few pro-sovereignty activists from the Parti québecois expressed the wish to have their picture taken with the FN president, the president of their party quickly backed off. A rejection that Marine Le Pen commented on Monday on Radio Canada:
“I am in some way the symbol of everything they submitted to, of everything they renounced in the fight for identity, for sovereignty. They do not enjoy being brought face to face with this mirror, this reality. Perhaps that’s why they run from me,” she added.
During the entire trip, Marine Le Pen increased her criticism of the Canadian political class. After calling Justin Trudeau and his government “false humanists”, regarding Canada’s refugee policy, Marine Le Pen hammered the nail in more deeply in an interview with Midi Info:
“A certain number of governments are naive when faced with the problem of immigration. They are what I call bleeding hearts.”
Note: She went on to explain that what she meant was the “belief that all is well, that everything is wonderful and that there will never be a problem.” Note that she did not explicitly mention Islam. Her remark was quite mild.
But her misadventures did not stop there for Marine Le Pen. According to QMI, a Canadian press agency, she was unpleasantly surprised to learn on Monday evening that one of her reservations at the Marriott in downtown Montreal had been cancelled. She was expected to hold a press conference there on Tuesday. Between thirty and fifty demonstrators outside the hotel booed Marine Le Pen, who, in the end, did not show up, forcing the management to cancel her reservation. Earlier that evening, she had been booed as she left a party meeting. Three demonstrators were arrested by police.
Note: According to Radio Canada, she gave a speech Monday night to sympathizers, in a downtown restaurant in Montreal. More than one hundred protesters demonstrated their opposition to the visit on Quebec soil of the French politician. So I assume that though she was able to speak earlier in the evening on Monday, the management of the Marriott still decided to cancel her reservation for the Tuesday press conference.
One cancellation leads to another and a communiqué from the Front National published Tuesday added another misadventure to the already loaded series:
“After the Marriott-Champlain, the Sheraton cancelled the reservation that would have allowed Marine Le Pen to meet the press. The subjects tackled by Marine Le Pen since her arrival in Quebec must be especially sensitive and increased pressures are preventing her from meeting the media. Once again, not only is democracy at stake, but freedom of expression. In Quebec, as in France, Marine Le Pen will not yield to intimidations.”
To top it off, Marine Le Pen was not able to visit enterprises, as she had initially intended. According to what she said, the Trudeau government cancelled all her visits to enterprises, including one at Bombardier. She was to participate in these meetings in her capacity as a member of the delegation on international commerce of the EU Parliament.
Note: Was this a disaster for Marine, or a disaster for Canada? Even if some of her remarks were critical, nothing justifies this type of “welcome” from a major Western country with a sizable Francophone population to a major French politician, the only French politician with any ideas worth considering.
Below, an antiracist banner greeted Marine Le Pen on March 20. It reads:
“Here, in the land of welcome, we prefer the arrival of thousands of immigrants to a visit by one racist.”
Angela Merkel could not have said it better.
