Serge Fiori, a “remarkable Canadian”?: Minister Steven Guilbeault creates controversy

Is Serge Fiori a “remakeable Canadian”? Furthermore, The Minister of Canadian Identity. Furthermore, Culture, Steven Guilbeault, defends himself from having wanted to recover the inheritance of the singer of Harmonium, a sovereignist of the early hour, during the Canadian festival.

In front of a crowd dressed in the colors of the Unifolié on the Plains Lebreton in Ottawa on Tuesday. Consequently, Mr. In addition, Guilbeault paid tribute to “remarkable Canadians” recently deceased who “left an indelible mark on the country”. However, like Murray Sinclair, Donald Sutherland, “as well as legendary artists like Serge Fiorium”.

In English, Mr. Moreover, Guilbeault continues: “Their voices, as well as those of many other great Canadians, have helped shape our cultural identity. Therefore, Their inheritance is found in the people they have inspired. For example, in the changes they have caused and in Canada that serge fiori, “remarkable canadian”?: minister they helped build. ”

“It’s unacceptable”

An extract from this segment has been relayed on social networks. and since then, the Minister has attracted the wrath of sovereignist Internet users and even of the Minister of Culture of the CAQ, Mathieu Lacombe.

“Quebec is a nation. Its culture is not a branch of Canadian culture, but a unique, distinct culture. Talking about Fiori as a Canadian without mentioning Quebec is implicitly denying this reality. It’s unacceptable, “he said on X.

The Steven Guilbeault office reacted to the controversy in a written declaration sent to the “Journal”.

“Serge Fiori has left an indelible mark on our culture. in Quebec as in the whole of Canada, with gathering songs and celebrated throughout the Canadian Francophonie, it was therefore important for us to pay tribute to him yesterday,” said the Minister’s press secretary, Hermine Landry.

No Canada Day for Fiori

Serge Fiori. who died on Saint-Jean-Baptiste day, was an ardent defender of Quebec’s independence. With Harmonium, he even opened René Lévesque’s speeches around the province.

The deputy for the PQ Pascal Bérubé recalled in an interview that Serge Fiori has always refused to sing. for the Canada Day.

The elected official of Matane-Matapédia judges that Minister Guilbeault wanted to make “political recovery”. “From there to use his memory on July 1 for Canadian unit. I don’t think it was appropriate,” he said on the phone.

Former PQ leader Jean-François Lisée goes further and believes that “apologies are in order”. “This does not forbid you to love your music. But it is insulting his memory serge fiori, “remarkable canadian”?: minister to instrumentalize him to celebrate the country he wanted to get out. “he wrote on X.

For the spokesperson of the Bloc Québécois in heritage Martin Champoux. it is time “to make an observation, collectively, of this ignorance or this trivialization of the nationalist Quebec identity”.

“When it is returned to be unknown to the point of using icons so openly displayed in favor of. Quebec’s independence […] What does Serge Fiori, I wonder where we are going to stop? We will say that Pierre Bourgault is a great Canadian? Are we going to talk about René Lévesque as a large builder of the Canadian unit? ”