Lack of consultation, desire to cut off dialogue with supporters’ associations… The national supporters’ association (ANS) has issued a heavy charge against the new Minister of Sports, Gil Avérous, accused of making the current situation worse by his lack of clairvoyance.
In a six-page long letter, the ANS is not kind to the minister whom it accuses from the outset: “Since taking office, you have never sought to interact directly with our association and have not never involved in the work of the national supporter body. »
What broke the camel’s back was the minister’s recent outing on the PSG supporters‘ tifo with the slogan “Free Palestine”. Obviously, the ANS only moderately appreciated the threats of the minister who explained that he would request the banning of any tifo of a political nature. “You decide in your press release that a political tifo has no place in a sporting arena. This assertion disregards the fundamental principles of our rule of law,” states the ANS.
“Total ignorance on the part of the government of the issue”
For the latter, the position of the Minister of Sports, as opposed to the former minister, Amélie Oudéa-Castéra with whom the dialogue was present, can no longer hold. The ANS thinks it understands its position according to three possibilities: “Either it was a matter of exploiting the media coverage of football to portray the image of an authoritarian government; either it was a matter of giving pledges to police unions whose influence in the Ministry of the Interior is known and which we understand are rightly annoyed to see so many police forces mobilized on weekend for football matches; or it is in reality simply a matter of total ignorance on the part of the government of the question.”
And to drive the point home: “In the ten years that we have been working with ministries and sports authorities, we have never been confronted with such exploitation of football and its stands for political communication purposes. »
In conclusion, the ANS formulates a “graceful appeal” asking the Minister of Sports to “withdraw, without delay, your press release of November 8, 2024”. In this press release, the subject of the association’s wrath, Gil Avérous notably calls for a ban on tifos at PSG until the end of the year. The association goes so far as to threaten the government with legal action: “Failing that, we will ask our lawyer to submit the legality of this censorship of supporters’ freedom of expression to the control of the administrative judge.” , concludes the ANS.
