After starting out in the private sector, Mathieu Gallet worked as a technical advisor for audiovisual and media at the Ministry of Culture and Communication with Christine Albanel, then with Frédéric Mitterrand, who appointed him Director cabinet in 2010. At 33, he became Chairman and CEO of INA, the National Audiovisual Institute. Four years later, new hat, he became president of Radio France. In 2018, he was sentenced at first instance for favoritism in a contract award case during his term of office. He was, in fact, dismissed from his post at Radio France by the CSA. The Paris Court of Appeal partially acquitted him in 2021 and ordered him to pay a fine. He publishes Power games published by Bouquins.
franceinfo: In this book, you come back to this famous destructive rumor which was undoubtedly the cause of your professional downfall. A rumor of intimate relations with Emmanuel Macron who, at the time, was not yet President of the Republic. Why did you wait so long to express yourself on this subject?
Mathieu Gallet: I wanted to bring a triple testimony through this book. A testimony on a life course, I did neither the ENA nor Polytechnique and I arrived young at important functions in public companies. I wanted, of course, to give my testimony on the work that we did at Radio France with my teams, work that has made it possible to deploy the antennas of Radio France largely on digital and to enjoy audience success today which are solid. And also a testimony on the mores politico-media. I was in that world and I was confronted with those mores, both in my experience in a ministerial office, but also, here, at Radio France, with all the tensions with the shareholder at the time, who was the Minister of Culture.
We also have the impression that with his disappointments, you grew up very quickly.
I think that all experiences are good to live, even the bad ones, and I had very good ones in this house, I tell them about them and I had difficult ones, especially this departure.
“There is a feeling of waste and unfinished when I left Radio France four years ago now.”
Mathieu Galletat franceinfo
I am leaving for reasons that are external to Radio France. And that’s what I say in this book, what hurts me the most is to leave this team.
Has what you experienced here changed your outlook on the future, on your ambitions, your desires?
It didn’t change my perspective because I had already been well trained at the Ministry of Culture. I saw how media exposure was a parameter that complicated your life. Indeed, there, I took the full brunt of it, especially in 2015 at Radio France with this big strike. But what emerges is that when you have clear ideas, a vision, you have to stay the course and know how to surround yourself with the right people. You have to know how to listen, but you also have to know how to be sure of your vision, your convictions and chart your course.
In this book, you scratch people. You assume fully. It was also difficult to say to you: “I say that, I don’t say that” or did it come naturally after four years?
It came quite naturally precisely because there was time. It’s not a book that I wrote when I left, it’s not a book made of resentment. Instead, the good memories remain. Afterwards, I actually trace the attitude of a certain number of protagonists without pushing them, but simply saying who they were, how they behaved because you mustn’t be naive either and that you have to know how to protect yourself.
I would like to address this rumor. It’s true that we wondered for a very long time why you didn’t deny it. You quote very important things, in particular, you tell a voice message from Emmanuel Macron who speaks of “us”. This “we”, you do not understand it.
I did not want to give testimony at the time, because the target was Emmanuel Macron, let’s be clear, I was only the object to block him in this political ascent. Finally, I bring my contribution, four years later, by saying that this rumor is not based on anything because we are not friends, we are professional acquaintances, nothing more and that these are the people who ended up believing it and wanted to believe it.
“It’s very hard to turn your neck away from a noise. There are always people who say: ‘But there’s no smoke without fire’. There was no fire at all. ”
Mathieu Galletat franceinfo
It’s your mother who encourages you, moreover, to write, she pushes you, she threatens you by saying: “If you don’t do it, I’m going to do it”. You managed to channel that anger, that real disappointment at being fired.
Feeling of waste, sadness. Even when you are a big business owner, as was my case here, you are still a man with your moments of doubt, the moments when you feel more vulnerable and the moments when you go back on your horse because we know that we are well surrounded.
Did this book relieve you, do you any good?
It makes me happy with the feedback I have today from readers because I am told that it is a book, sincere, authentic and it is exactly what I wanted. . Really, it’s a book that I wrote with heart, with memory, with humor too because I wanted people to have a good time reading it.