Medina: why Nicolas Bay is indicted on a rapper’s complaint

MEDINA. Nicolas Bay, vice-president of Reconquête!, the party of Eric Zemmour, was indicted for defamation of the rapper Médine.

[Mis à jour le 18 mai 2022 à 15h10] Medina facing politicians, act 2. The vice-president of the Reconquest! by Éric Zemmour, Nicolas Bay, is indicted for defamation after a complaint filed by rapper Médine, reports this Wednesday, May 18, 2022 France Blue Normandy, which quotes the entourage of the artist. In 2021, during the regional election campaign, Nicolas Bay accused Medina of being close to “the Islamist movement” in one of his leaflets. He also denounced the financial aid granted by the Normandy region for the production of the documentary Medina Normandywhich retraces the life of the artist.

“I will strive to demonstrate without difficulty during the trial the reality of what I said, namely that Medina was characterized by very real, public links and which he himself recognized with associations and personalities of this movement”, Nicolas Bay told France Bleu Normandie after confirming his indictment for defamation. And this is not the first time that Medina has come up against politicians.

It all starts in June 2021, in the middle of the campaign for the regional elections and while Nicolas Bay is the RN candidate in Normandy. On June 23, Médine announced that it had initiated legal proceedings against the head of Marine Le Pen’s party list for defamation after comments made against her on social networks. At the heart of the controversy, the documentary Medina Normandypartly subsidized by the Normandy region and screened in a cinema in Le Havre on June 24, 2021.

On Twitter, June 22, 2022, Nicolas Bay qualifies in a message posted on Twitter, the documentary Medina Normandy as being “a biopic to praise the ‘artistic’ career of the Le Havre rapper Médine. This close friend of the Islamist movement of the Muslim Brotherhood did not hesitate to name one of his albums ‘Jihad’.” Médine had then reproached Nicolas Bay for his ignorance of the documentary.

“In reality, everything he accuses me of is completely deconstructed in the documentary. He accuses me of being close to terrorism and extremists, while I am the first to fight them in my region, through concrete actions, such as my support for local associations! I do not accept any lessons from this Norman at the fictitious home. And I want to fight against this shameful montage made against me. This is a simple reminder to the republican order”, declared Médine then, questioned by France 3 Normandy.

On February 23, 2021, Médine announced that it had filed a complaint against LREM deputy Aurore Bergé for defamation at the Paris court. In question ? The comments made by the elected official in March in an interview given to LCI on February 18, 2021, referring to a conference given by Aurore Bergé at the Ecole Normale Supérieure (ENS). “This Islamist rapper Medina, you know, the one who said that secularists had to be killed, is it legitimate for a school as prestigious as the ENS to give voice to those who call for murder?” she asked.

Already targeted by right-wing and far-right elected officials in 2018, Medina explained to Mediapart the reasons for filing the complaint. “It’s one too many times. I am witnessing the media turnaround of this fringe of the government which is becoming radicalized by adopting a more right-wing, even extreme right-wing discourse. I have the impression that the time for dialogue is over. All these people do not take the time to read our work”, explained the rapper from Le Havre, who said he wanted to “promote [s]rights”, claiming to be the victim of “false accusations.”

According to the rapper, Aurore Bergé “sticks an ideology to him which is, of course, not the [s]ienne.” If the member was referring in part to the song Don’t Laik, which evokes a crucifixion of the secularists, for Medina, this “piece is a succession of absurdities, oxymorons”, and of which the chosen one took a quote out of context. “Aurore Bergé’s ignorance of rap and style is blatant. I invite her to do what she should have done before speaking on LCI”, launched the artist in the columns of Médiapart. He then wanted “a condemnation and a public apology”, but also “damages”. “My honor is at stake,” he concluded.

In 2018, Médine was to perform at the Bataclan in Paris on October 19 and 20. Scheduled for several months, these concerts, planned in one of the theaters of the terrorist attacks of November 13, 2015, had aroused at the time a vast controversy linked to the words of the rapper. Associations of victims had immediately expressed their desire to have his visit banned. Elected officials from the right, far-right and from the La République en Marche party were indignant at the lyrics of his songs Jihad Where Don’t Laikwhich they already considered, like Aurore Bergé and Nicolas Bay, to go in the direction of the doctrines of the Islamist jihadists.

In Don’t Laik, Medina declares in particular: “Let us crucify the secularists as in Golgotha”. Words that have not gone unnoticed. “A call to murder” had already judged Aurore Bergé at the time. Médine was then quickly explained in the face of these accusations. “I absolutely wanted to talk about the way in which a republican value such as secularism is manipulated today when, in its spirit and its letter, secularism is made to bring people together,” he said.

“Don’t Laik is to secular fundamentalisms what Charlie Hebdo cartoons are to religious fundamentalisms”, he defended himself a little later in a column published in L’Obs. A petition had even emerged under the impetus of Grégory Roose , former departmental delegate of the FN. The concert at the Bataclan had finally been canceled, in the face of pressure and even si the concert hall mentioned a cancellation “out of respect for the victims of the attacks of November 13, 2015 and their families.” Medina, he justified this decision otherwise: “Some far-right groups have planned to organize demonstrations whose goal is to divide, not hesitating to manipulate and rekindle the pain of the families of the victims.”