Former PQ member Pierre Curzi is accused of having reduced the liberal Monsef Derraji to the foreign sounding of his name, Friday morning, during a column at the microphone of Paul Arcand.
Called to give his opinion on the potential candidates for the succession of Dominique Anglade, Pierre Curzi suggested that Monsef Derraji could be in this race the representative of the fringe of the Liberal Party with an immigrant background, given his original name. Arab.
” I do not know him. […] I don’t want to say nonsense, but I imagine that he is someone who is quite well known in all communities. His name seems to indicate in any case that he has acquaintances with certain communities. Maybe, “said the former deputy for sovereignty, who replaced columnist Jonathan Trudeau at short notice on Friday morning at Since you have to get up.
Monsef Derraji immediately denounced this analysis on Twitter, which he considered reductive. “Reducing a person to the sound of his name is neither a political concept that I share with you, nor a way of doing political analysis intended for all Quebecers. Pull yourself together, ”wrote the MP for Nelligan, in the west of Montreal.
. @Pierre_Curzi Reducing a person to the sound of his name is neither a political concept that I share with you, nor a way of doing political analysis intended for all Quebecers.
Pull yourself together.
CC: @PQFSL @PaulArcand #PolQc #PQFSL— Monsef Derraji (@monsefderraji) November 11, 2022
During his column, Pierre Curzi also argued that federal deputy Joël Lightbound could be the English-speaking community’s candidate in this leadership race, again relying strictly on the sound of his name. Conversely, André Fortin could be the voice of Francophones during this leadership race, deduced Pierre Curzi.
“These three candidates are the three candidates who somewhat represent what remains of the Liberal Party: a minority of Francophones [avec André Fortin]Anglophones with Mr. Lightbound, and I presume that Mr. Derraji is well established among the allophones”, summarized Pierre Curzi on the airwaves of 98.5, before Paul Arcand specifies that Monsef Derraji was born in Morocco, but is settled in Quebec for several years.
Misleading analysis
Joined by The duty then, Pierre Curzi immediately accepted his remarks, seeing nothing scandalous in it. “I didn’t mean to insult him, it’s just that I didn’t know [M. Derraji]. I just figured he probably had a connection to different communities. But if I insulted him, I’m sorry, it was not my intention, “said the man who left politics in 2012.
Mr Curzi pointed out that his surname too sounds foreign, and that he would have no problem being associated with the Italian community for this reason.
That being said, André Fortin may have a francophone name, but he is the member for a riding in the Outaouais where nearly 40% of the population has English as their mother tongue. How does he represent the interests of Francophones more than Joël Lightbound, elected to the House of Commons in an almost exclusively Francophone sector of Quebec? Joël Lightbound was born in Toronto to an English-speaking father and a French-speaking mother, but he grew up in the Quebec region.
“OK, I get it… I’m sorry I did that. But since I didn’t know either of them, I thought that one had affinities with English speakers, and the other with non-English speakers. If I was wrong, I apologize,” finally agreed Pierre Curzi, in an interview with the To have to.