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Photo credits: EMMANUEL DUNAND / AFP
Freshly invested Minister of National Education, Pap Ndiaye appointed this Monday, May 23 Jean Marc Huart as chief of staff according to L’Express. If the new minister tries to appear as “the anti Blanquer” because of his symbolic differences with the former minister, it is today the choice of the continuity of the quinquennium Blanquer which is essential with this appointment. Indeed, Jean Marc Huart was at the heart of the reactionary policies carried out by the previous minister. As education historian Claude Lelièvre summarizes for L’Expressthe position occupied by Jean Marc Huart (DGESCO) from 2017 to 2019 is central in the administration: “He is the head of National Education, a sort of deputy minister who steers the policy decided by the ministry at all levels: primary, middle and high school.
Pap Ndiaye will therefore have, as chief of staff, a man who applied the many reactionary policies of the previous five-year term, like the symposium on wokism organized in the midst of the fifth wave of Covid-19, the battle against the alleged “Islamo-leftism” in National Education and the university, or even the controversies over republican outfits.
Worse still, Jean Marc Huart is potentially involved in the Avenir lycéen affair, a scandal which concerns the corruption of minors, involving Blanquer in person and his close collaborators. The Avenir Lycéen union, known for its pro-government positions and made up of some of its members from young people with Macron (JAM), has not only benefited from handsome subsidies (€95,000 over two years) while the other unions saw their means drop, but was also piloted by the ministry to break the dynamic of protest that was taking hold among high school students. Clairanne Dufour, former president of Avenir Lycéen, affirmed that Maxence Duprez, founder of the union, and Jean-Marc Huart co-managed their digital communication. The name of the former DGESCO comes up regularly in this case.
To sum up, Jean marc Huart was one of the key elements of the reactionary policies and scandals of the Blanquer quinquennium. If symbolically, the figure of the academic anti-racist of Pap Ndiaye seems to contrast with the profile of Blanquer, the presence of Jean-Marc Huart at the head of his cabinet confirms his desire to continue the policy already started by his predecessor and to deepen the case of National Education wanted by Macron.
This appointment confirms that there should be no illusions in the new Minister of National Education. The horizon, for teachers and National Education staff, thus remains that of an increased precariousness of their profession, a deterioration of working conditions and the application, at school, of authoritarian methods. , managerial and repressive.
No illusions therefore in a pseudo “social dialogue” with Pap Ndiaye who, whatever his academic positions, will not be a bulwark against the reality of the violence of the regime of Emmanuel Macron, always harder for the world of work. For the National Education workers, the urgency is on the contrary to organize and prepare a “third social round” against future attacks from the government, which has already demonstrated its contempt too many times.
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