The journalists of the weekly castigate the coverage devoted, Thursday, July 7, to an ultra-conservative prelate little known to the public, while the group of the Breton billionaire is carrying out a takeover bid on that of Arnaud Lagardère.
The young retiree Vincent Bolloré, supposed to have ceased all activity on February 17, would he have taken control of Paris Match? The question has been tormenting the editorial staff since the decision was taken to put on the front page a prelate very little known to the general public, Cardinal Robert Sarah. Thursday, July 7, in newsstands, readers could discover the portrait, signed by Philippe Labro, that the weekly devotes six pages to this “man of influence and peace”. This choice, made against the opinion of the editorial staff, provoked an internal revolt.
On Monday before the closure, the editors wrote their disapproval to Constance Benqué, the general manager of the media division, and to Arnaud Lagardère, officially head of the title. The group is currently subject to a takeover bid by Vivendi, of which the Bolloré family is the largest shareholder. In essence, they explained that, if devoting an article to a personality like Cardinal Sarah could be justified, putting it on the “front page” constituted an editorial and commercial error, contrary to the line of a newspaper supposed to defend no bias ideological. On July 6, the society of journalists (SDJ) of Paris Match was in turn moved by “this perilous choice”, likely to “harm the image” of the publication.
“This prelate is known for his positions and defines himself as ‘radical’, defending very divisive positions,” she wrote in a statement. Opposed Pope Francis on the opening of the Church to remarried divorcees and homosexuals, as he developed in a book, published in 2015, God or nothing. Interview on faith (Fayard), the Guinean is worried about the progression of “populations of Islamic origin” led to the disappearance of a “decadent, childless, familyless” West, according to remarks made in Le Figaro, in 2016.
A veteran of the Vivendi media
The problem, these positions do not appear in the paper of Philippe Labro, who is content to evoke a “rigid conservative” . The very choice of the octogenarian journalist, notoriously close to Vincent Bolloré, a claimed Catholic, to interview the prelate raises questions: the weekly has long employed the great specialist in Catholicism Caroline Pigozzi. “The editorial management offered me to paint the portrait of this man, I was not associated with the choice of the” front page, “says World Philippe Labro, who prefers to put the controversy into perspective. In any newspaper, the LDS ask questions about the capitalists who own newspapers. It’s a normal course of life. »