WORLD : French Tourism Minister Forced Out in Hired Applause Incident
France’s tourism minister was forced to resign after it was revealed he paid unemployed actors and students to cheer Socialist speakers at a seminar he organized on the theme of progress, sources said today.
The government announced that Minister Olivier Stirn resigned of his own accord Wednesday night but the sources said it was clear that he did so at Premier Michel Rocard’s request.
The incident was highly embarrassing to the political Establishment, still smarting from the brouhaha over an amnesty law passed last year to protect legislators from prosecution for campaign financing irregularities.
Stirn paid about 100 students and unemployed actors $60 each last week to clap and cheer at a two-day seminar he organized in Paris around the theme of progress.
Numerous members of the governing Socialist Party spoke at the sessions, and messages from Rocard and President Francois Mitterrand were read to the delegates, adding to the government’s embarrassment.
The announcement of Stirn’s resignation came just hours after he told a television interviewer that he would not leave the government.
External Commerce Minister Jean-Marie Rausch was named Stirn’s successor.
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