French presidential policy on reforming Islam and a mighty L'Opinion spoof

 

 

As you scroll down, you'll reach my latest column for the London-based Arab Weekly. Click here to see all my work for that newspaper, reproduced with the editor's consent 

 

 

 

Newspaper readers - remember them? - need to be of a certain age to recall The Guardian's wonderful 1977 April Fool joke, a seven-page supplement about the island of San Seriffe, invented for the purpose.

The French magazine L'Opinion had a San Seriffe moment last week, running a 7,000+-word presidential address, ostensibly verbatim from the lips of Emmanuel Macron but made up from start to finish. It was credible enough in large parts to fool - if only briefly - a few people, well me and a distinguished French journalist to whom I turned as I sought verification that this was indeed Macron telling the nation how he proposed to implement his promise to reform the organisation of Islam while also tackling extremism.

Since the Elysée press 'service' never responds to my questions, I thought my confrère might know whether any other news organisations had picked it up or were doing so (I had seen no sign of this, hence my suspicions). He read through it as we spoke and said that while 'flowery' in parts, it could be genuine. Then I looked again and spotted a footnote, dismissed earlier as it looked like one of those web ads ...