Immaculate in appearance, ready to speak, constantly alert, with almost absolute self-control in his facial expressions and body movements and, despite the apparent calm, with a creeping tension.
Jordan Bardela, the “poulein” of Marine Le Pen, the late star, president and MEP of the far-right National Rally, the almost new prime minister of France, may have passed by some people unnoticed, passing, this afternoon, the lobby of a central hotel , in Athens, in order to participate in the Athens Democracy Forum.
However, in real life contact with him one can understand how the term “bardelomania” came about and why the 29-year-old politician has become a “brand” in the country, and is treated in every appearance as a “rock star”. He has the “nak”, the “metal” of the protagonist, at the same time, the chameleonism required to maneuver, being at the forefront of the political scene.
Was he upset that, while he was waiting for it, he didn’t finally land in the Matignon prime minister’s palace during the recent early French elections? “Yes,” he answered, disarmingly honest, with the unsullied relaxed cross-leg, the young meter of maneuvers, who in the “difficult” questions, despite the sparkling face, the passionate movement of the hands and the blurring of ideological boundaries, could not eliminate the his xenophobia and racism.
The questions that forced him and the contradictions
It was impressive to watch how during the questions that forced him for only fractions of a second his face darkened, a imperceptible contraction passing over him like “lightning”. And how he immediately regained self-control, immediately re-wearing the mask of politeness and eloquence.
Elegant (suit-tie) and in his conversation in Athens, with the head of the office of the New York Times, in Paris, Roger Cohen, without a higher education or a degree, the easy-going “protopalikaro” of the National Rally, developed with restrained passion Manichean schemes, on the economy, immigration, Europe, etc., without wavering, falling into contradictions, regarding his ideological sign (he stressed that the party has evolved since the time of Jean-Marie Le Pen and is no longer anti-Semitic, anti-immigrant). Arguing, with polite aggression, that “a party of 37% cannot be xenophobic”, denying, at the same time, the criticism that together with Mélenchon they constitute the two extremes. We are the voice of reason Melancholy is the extreme, was his pattern.
Despite the excellent effort to appear condescending, tolerant, “normal”, from “good morning” he sketched in black colors the Muslim community in France, from which the area where he grew up, in Saint Denis, “suffered”, although he wanted to repeat that he himself has immigrant roots (from Italy). He overemphasized, however, that the immigrants of the 60s and 70s, like his family, who “respect the country that welcomed them”, have nothing to do with the later ones, because of which “crime and rape increased” (at 93 % perpetrators are “foreigners” he emphasized).
“In France to govern you have to lose the elections”
“The fact that I question my country’s immigration policy does not make me a far-right and populist. We have to put order,” he defended, claiming that the ideology of Hamas, which attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, “survives in France.” “Are we xenophobic?” was the question he posed to everyone. And like the best actor, looking at the audience, he answered it by himself in one word: “No!”. He based his Islamist rhetoric on a phrase: “I don’t want my country to disappear.”
“In France to govern you have to lose the elections,” he indirectly accused Emmanuel Macron, whom he named as the person responsible who “together with the far-left parties does not allow us to govern.” Something that “can’t go on,” he commented, his face like a mask, holding back his anger.
Although he predicted that Macron will not last long until ’27, the year when “we will win” – in the meantime, he did not hide the complex that the National Rally is being treated as second-class citizens -, he did not open his cards on whether the party will give a “kick” to the new government, before its term ends.
Will he run for president in 2027? “No,” he replied with a smile. A refusal that, having in front of you this new cut, with the necessary audacity, political animal, is translated, without acrobatics, as “yes”.
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