Public Broadcaster Dept: “Step right up, ladies and gentlemen. Total clear-out sale of satirists,” Mr. Guillon railed in his farewell sketch. “My chances of being on the air again next year are about as good as the chance the French team will make the second round of the World Cup.”, according to Globe And Mail. It came just days after Mr. Sarkozy summoned the editor-in-chief of the prestigious but struggling daily Le Monde to the Élysee Palace with a threat to revoke government support for the paper, which is controlled by its staff, if it agreed to a proposed purchase by three businessmen who support the opposition Socialist party. The paper’s staff chose the left-wing businessmen as their new owners anyway. But the meeting was one of a series of events that have led to charges that Mr. Sarkozy is trying to “Berlusconize,” the French media, taking the Italian Prime Minister, media magnate Silvio Berlusconi, as his model and as it often goes when France’s media and government clash, Mr. Sarkozy’s view prevailed. And so Mr. Guillon and Mr. Porte signed on one recent morning to announce they had been fired from public broadcaster France Inter radio. Although the two comics maintained their humour until the end, their firing has raised serious new concerns about political interference in the French media. As
reported in the news.
Related Webpage
@t silvio berlusconi, three businessmen
29.6.10
