While the trial of the mayor of Roubaix Guillaume Delbar was to be held today for “misappropriation of public funds by negligence” after he had granted funding to an association accused of proselytism – Ambitions and Initiatives for Success (AAIR) -, the trial was finally adjourned to October 13.
A brief reminder of the facts. Last Sunday, January 23, M6 broadcast an episode of Zone Interdite with the title: “Faced with the danger of radical Islam, the responses of the State”. This was followed by a dive into the city of Roubaix, the voice of Ophélie Meunier – since under police protection -, notably guiding the viewer to a toy store that sells faceless dolls (the representation of faces is prohibited in a version radical Islam) or within a supposed Salafist organization under the guise of an educational support association. If the program caused a real outcry when it was broadcast, one man especially caught the attention: Guillaume Delbar.
He left the majority “Republicans and Independents” in the Regional Council of Hauts-de-France
This 50-year-old politician, re-elected in 2020 for a second term with the support of LREM, the LRs and the MoDem and tried in December 2021 for tax evasion (he has since appealed), is criticized for his management of the northern city and in particular for having financed a Salafist association to buy social peace and for not having been able to enforce secularism in the public space. He was to be tried on Tuesday for “negligent embezzlement of public funds. Following the controversy, he left the “Republicans and Independents” majority in the Hauts-de-France Regional Council, so as not to “become an issue in the debates”.
Also present in the show (and since threatened with death), the lawyer Amine Elbahi. The one who sounded the alarm in 2020 to denounce the activities of the AAIR association at the town hall of Roubaix – remained deaf to the complaints -, shed light on this organization, in particular on its Arabic lessons which would be, in fact, Koranic courses, all subsidized by public funds.
AAIR was created in 2007 by Nordine Khabzaoui, a member of the Roubaix Salafist mosque Abou Bakr. The latter offered tutoring and Arabic lessons supported by public subsidies. After an alert, then an administrative investigation by the prefecture, the association is asked to reimburse more than 25,000 euros in subsidies in March 2021 for actions “contrary to the values of the Republic and secularism”.
Any reproduction prohibited