The French have remained split over his legacy
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Military mastermind who gave France its grandeur and civil code or brutal despot and one of world’s "worst misogynists” who reinstated slavery in the land of human rights and fatally overplayed his hand at Waterloo?
The jury is still out on Napoleon Bonaparte as France remains locked in fraught argument over how, if at all, to commemorate the 200th anniversary of his death.
The pint-sized Corsican died in captivity on the British island of Saint Helena at the age of 51 on May 5th 1821.
The French have remained split over his legacy ever since, with 85,000 books penned on England’s nemesis — more than the days passed since his demise.
Nevertheless, the debate has taken an incendiary turn in recent weeks as the country limbers up for the landmark anniversary.
In the red corner are those who say the Gaul should be given a wide berth.
Alexis Corbière, a deputy from Unsubmissive France, a Leftist party, declared: “It is not for the republic to celebrate its gravedigger.”
The French have remained split over his legacy
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In the age of Black Lives Matter, the notion of feting a leader who reintroduced slavery to the French West Indies in 1802 — eight years after it was abolished — is anathema to many.
A recently recovered Napoleonic decree shows the first consul had offered slaves in Guadeloupe freedom in 1784 if they joined French troops to oust the English occupant only to enact a U-turn once victory was assured.
“It’s neither a stain nor a fault; it’s a crime,” said Louis Georges Tin, honorary president of the “black associations of France” group, Cran. “France is the only country to have re-established slavery.”
As a result, Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol, the Socialist mayor of Rouen, says he wants to replace the bronze statue of the emperor on horseback that stands outside his town hall, replacing it with a woman.
“He was racist, sexist, despotic, militaristic, a coloniser, but all that is generally swept under the carpet,” said political scientist Françoise Vergès. “There is such nostalgia over the former grandeur of France that all is forgiven. It’s time to end this blindness.”
Equality minister Elisabeth Moreno also weighed in calling him “one of history’s greatest misogynists".
Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol, the Socialist mayor of Rouen, says he wants to replace the bronze statue
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In the blue corner are those who assert modern France owes much of its state institutions to the “little Corsican”, who created the French legal code, the Bank of France, the administrative system of préfets, the state council, the légion d’honneur and French lycées.
Still wildly popular in his native country, a poll in 2019 saw him crowned most important Frenchman in history, above Louis XIV and Charles de Gaulle. His enduring aura sees his tomb in Les Invalides in a crypt beneath the dome attract over a million visitors a year.
“People know very well that he re-established slavery but you can’t reduce him to that. No other figure has marked history like him,” said Thierry Lentz, head of the Napoleon Foundation and released For Napoleon, a book in his defence, this week.
The biggest-ever exhibition on Napoleon is due to open in Paris on April 14, but even that has not avoided controversy amid reports disgruntled staff — some of whom are from French overseas territories -would only proceed after receiving assurances it would be no hagiography.
A carnival float, depicting a caricature of French President Emmanuel Macron in Napoleon pose
Credit: FABIAN SOMMER /DPA
Right-wing MP Julien Aubert issued an open asking: “Will France be the only country in the world in 2021 not to admire Napoleon?” The first consul-turned-emperor, he claimed, had fallen foul of the “dictates of political correctness”, which seek to “expiate everything that made (France) great and glorious” and have turned Napoleon into “the odious symbol of the proponents of cancel culture”.
He accused President Emmanuel Macron of wimping out on paying tribute like his Gaullist predecessor Jacques Chirac, who refused amid acrimony to commemorate the bicentenary of Napoleon’s greatest victory at Austerlitz.
The president’s reticence was all the more surprising, he said, given his appetite for grand commemorative ceremonies to the glory of France.
“I don’t see him glossing over the event. That’s not his style,” countered Stéphane Berne, the president’s special heritage ambassador. “Moreover, he himself has something of Bonaparte.”
Mr Macron finally broke his silence over the issue this week with government spokesman Gabriel Attal confirming: “Naturally there will be a commemoration by the president of the Republic”. The Elysee will disclose details later.
He added: “Napoleon is a major figure of our history who should be viewed with eyes wide open.”
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