This time, Philippe de Villiers will weigh heavily in the balance. In the coming days, the speeches of the former president of the Movement for France (MPF), notably in the program “Face à Philippe de Villiers” broadcast on Saturday morning on CNews and broadcast by Europe 1, will have to be put on the ducamp note “miscellaneous right”. So decided the Regulatory Authority for Audiovisual and Digital Communication (Arcom), which revealed, on Thursday March 7, its recommendations in view of the European elections of June 8 and 9.
While Eric Zemmour’s support for the 2022 presidential election has benefited from substantial media exposure since the start of the school year, the regulator could no longer ignore the return of the Vendéen “in the political field”. From April 15, moreover, and under the rules of political pluralism enacted in 2011, and supplemented with each new electoral deadline, the Canal+ group channel must respect a principle of fairness between the different political forces present in the European ballot. Neither more nor less than all radio and television stations, since the rules are the same for everyone – a list of other personalities to be included, such as Roselyne Bachelot, columnist on BFMTV, has just been adopted.
“We wanted to extend the period [d’observation de ce principe d’équité] from six weeks before the election to eight weeks, the electoral campaign having already, in fact, begun”, further explained Roch-Olivier Maistre, the president of Arcom. Contrary to the rules that apply during presidential election campaigns, editors will not need to count the speaking times of each of the candidates in the running to the nearest second (twenty-seven different lists to date, compared to thirty- four in 2019) and their “explicit support”nor in particular time slots, nor even to change calculation mode along the way.
A “little room for maneuver”
For these Europeans, there is only one period observed, and equality of speaking time is not expected: it is “fairness” which prevails. This is left to the discretion of the publishers, who must rely on three criteria to evaluate it: “The results of previous European elections, opinion polls, and contributions to debates, during public meetings or on social networks”detailed Anne Grand d’Esnon, the advisor in charge of pluralism issues at Arcom.
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