Journalist Edwy Plenel reflects on his commitment as a Trotskyist militant. Arrived in Paris at 18, he sold "Rouge" the newspaper of the Revolutionary Communist League. He was active for 10 years in this organization which he describes as the "libertarian branch of Trotskyism". He defines himself by a formula he invented: "cultural Trotskyism". He kept from this "intellectual family" intangible principles: not to be on the side of reason of state, party reason, power.
Claire CHAZAL receives the editor-in-chief of Le Monde, Edwy PLENEL in the context of the Elysée phone tapping case of which the journalist was a victim. According to Edwy PLENEL, this case reveals a fundamental problem of democracy. He stressed the need to react and explained why he was tapped. He concludes by calling this practice "totalitarian" and by stressing the need to create a counter-power to prevent such a case from recurring.
Edwy PLENEL will soon create a MediaPart information site. At the origin of the project, the desire to allow the existence of journalism completely independent of political and economic powers. Currently the written press is subject to many pressures: buybacks followed by social plans. He believes that the links between the owners of the titles "the oligarchy that is at the heart of this system" and the current political power have never been stronger. Another issue is to question the role of journalists. "We cannot conceive a media without thinking about the place of reader". The job of journalist is the work on information that involves investigating, going into the fields, questioning. However, he believes that public debate is not the property of journalists: "freedom of expression does not belong only to journalists".
The Socialist Party is considering filing a complaint following an article in Le Monde suggesting that the party would have benefited from funding, in the context of the campaign of the presidential election of1988, thanks to a percentage on a contract concluded between the French government and the government of the former dictator of Panama Manuel Noriega. During an investigation entitled "In the footsteps of Christopher Columbus", the author Edwy PLENEL mentioned two letters relating to an agreement. Interview with journalist Edwy PLENEL, author of the article, about these letters.
In the editorial offices of the news site Mediapart, its founder and president Edwy PLENEL defends the paid model of the site, a guarantee of independence and credibility. He recalls the Munich Code of Ethics, concerning journalism: "our professional loyalty is to the citizens. It is not about the government or our employers".
While France is experiencing a revival of investigative journalism, with several cases revealed in particular by the newspaper "Le Monde", journalists face many bans in their investigations of institutions, which lead to a form of censorship and the multiplication of trials against newspapers. Interview with Edwy PLENEL about the illegal eavesdropping during the Greenpeace affair and the proceedings initiated by Ministers Albin Chalandon and Charles Pasqua against the newspaper "Le Monde".
Following the revelations made by his newspaper Le Monde, Edwy PLENEL intervenes on stage to take stock of the investigation. Like his colleague from Le Canard Enchaîné, Claude Angeli, he highlights the existence of a third team in New Zealand, composed of two combat swimmers from the French army. The question remains: "Who gave them this mission? Who gave them that order?". Taking all the precautions required to gather information from different sources, Edwy Plenel assumes that these swimmers belong to the combat swimmer training center based in Corsica. He concludes in these terms: "the high military hierarchy, in the sense of the high political hierarchy of the military, which raises the problem of the minister, cannot not have been put in confidence."
Questioned about the Jérôme Cahuzac Affair, the Minister of Budget accused by the news site Mediapart of having owned undeclared funds on an account in Switzerland, then in Singapore, Edwy PLENEL president of Mediapart, denounces the "feeling of a political and financial oligarchy that feels above the common law. "Mediapart" was very lonely! This questions all actors of democracy. '
After the success of the book "La face cachée du Monde" by Pierre Péan and Philippe Cohen against the newspaper "Le Monde", Edwy PLENEL, editor of Le Monde, is interviewed on stage by Laurence Bobillier, on the attacks published in the book which he describes as slander.