As a mayor, France’s new Prime minister threw away 8,500 chocolate mousses that contained pork gelatine

France’s new Prime Minister Edouard Philippe is pro-Islam. In 2012, as the Mayor of Le Havre, he bent the French law to submit to the Sharia law. Out of respect for diversity, he ordered to throw away 8,500 chocolate desserts from Le Havre school canteens, as they contained pig gelatine, which Islam forbid to consume.

December 2012. Some 8,500 chocolate mousses, prepared for 67 primary and nursery schools canteens in Le Havre were discarded due to the presence of pig gelatine.

The measure was taken at last minute by city mayor Edouard Philippe, who submitted to the law of Islam, the Sharia law, after the kitchen staff reported that pig gelatine had been used to prepare chocolate mousses, which is forbidden to Muslims. Instead of respecting strict secular neutrality, Philippe ordered to throw the mousses away.

Desserts “may occasionally contain animal gelatine,” said Philippe Brunel, Le Havre city hall deputy director general for social and family development.

A scandalous and financial mess

The municipal counselor Yves Bertrand called for the opening of a municipal inquiry. For him, “Local authorities must apply the principles of secularity, therefore they must respect strict neutrality in the preparation of meals, and that also apply to the public school municipal kitchens.”

“The supposed or proven presence of a particular product in the manufacture of chocolate mousse must obey to a single rule: respect for food hygiene, nothing else”, added Bertrand, and above all not obey the Laws of Islam.

“All other considerations for a particular religion belong to the private domain. So it has nothing to do in canteens, in the choice of products or in the preparation of meals,” added the municipal counselor who denounced “a scandalous food and financial mess at the very moment where the ‘Restos du coeur’ [an NGO who feed the homeless] and other charities are struggling to help feed more and more of our fellow citizens.”

Sebastien Leger, president of the FCPE (Seine-Maritime Parents association) was shocked. He said:

“It’s a tremendous mess. We cannot imagine throwing as many chocolate mousses, which has been eaten in the past. I do not look at the ingredients of this or that, and if it displeases anyone, which I can understand, for philosophical or religious reasons, nobody is obliged to eat the meal in question, nor the product in question. Everyone is free to do whatever he wants, but it seems to me that school has an intangible principle and that is secularism.”

Even Benjamin Planchon, coordinator of Restos du coeur in Le Havre, had the chocolate creams stuck in her throat.

“We could find a way to redistribute them. If they were not not eatable in the schools, it could be done as part of our activities for the homeless or as part of hot meals.”

At the time, the incident provoked a scandal. The fury of the French facing this submission to a foreign religion while the Christmas cribs disappeared from City Halls out of respect for secularism was at its height, to the point that mainstream news media like BFMTV had to close their comment section to silence any complaint.

Now that Edouard Philippe is France’s prime minister, French people can always try to complain, but their comment section is closed for 5 years.