Former Spanish PM accused of racism in remarks about French football team

The former Spanish conservative prime minister Mariano Rajoy is facing growing accusations of racism after writing in a World Cup newspaper column that the French national team “does not have any French players”.

Rajoy, who was in office from 2011 to 2018, pondered Spain’s looming semi-final showdown with France in an article for the online newspaper El Debate on Friday.

“It’s worth remembering that France has been a two-time world champion and was a finalist in the last World Cup,” he wrote. “They’ve won every match they’ve played in this World Cup and are currently ranked No 1 in the Fifa rankings. They also have a top-level squad. That said, they don’t have any French players. And they’re playing very well. They’ll be a formidable opponent.”

Rajoy’s remarks, which have drawn comparisons to a Paraguayan senator’s recent racist social media attack on Kylian Mbappé, elicited a scathing response from Spain’s current prime minister.

“There are those who still measure belonging by surname, place of birth, or skin colour,” Pedro Sánchez wrote in a post on X.

“Others measure it by our roots in a country and our will to contribute to it. Playing soccer. Caring for our elders. Or opening businesses. Spain belongs to those who love it and work for it. Not to those who shame it with xenophobic statements.”

Rajoy’s words provoked a furious response in France.

“That’s completely unacceptable,” France’s interior minister, Laurent Nuñez, told the French channel BFMTV on Sunday. “That’s completely not what France is about. France is a country of diversity where everyone can thrive and find their place.”

Olivier Faure, the leader of the French Socialist party, said the French national team was composed only of French citizens.

“France is not an ethnic nation; it has no skin colour or religion,” he added in a post on X. “It is a political nation united around the republican motto – much to the chagrin of the racist right.”

Fabien Roussel, the leader of the French Communist party, condemned Rajoy and said his words were reminiscent of the racist tirade from the Paraguayan senator, Celeste Amarilla, who called Mbappé a “colonised Cameroonian, desperately trying to ⁠pass himself off as French”.

Roussel said: “They cannot help but spew filthy racism in an attempt to annoy our beautiful French team.”

Others saw a familiar pattern. “The same racist obsessions and insults resurface every time [France] wins,” said Naïma Moutchou, France’s minister for overseas territories.

“These aren’t just ‘slips of the tongue’. It’s a methodical and normalised hatred of France and what it represents.”

Moutchou called on the French football federation, which has already filed a complaint with Paris prosecutors over Amarilla’s remarks, to “pursue all legal avenues”.

Sánchez ended his post on X with a cordial wish: “France, we’ll see you in the semi-finals. May the best team win and may racism lose.”