President Emmanuel Macron was under fire from the French left on Friday for handing billionaire Amazon founder Jeff Bezos the country’s highest order of merit.
Critics said the award showed Macron really was “the president of the rich” as he is regularly labelled by members of the opposition.
Macron’s office on Friday confirmed a press report from a day earlier, saying Bezos had been given the Legion d’Honneur (Legion of Honour), the French republic’s highest award, in a small ceremony.
The event’s took place on February 16, the same day hundreds of thousands of people joined strikes and protests against Macron’s plan to reform the French pension system.
Critics say the reform plan is particularly unfair towards low-income workers without a university education, because they would see their already long working lives stretched out even further.
Macron’s office kept quiet about the award ceremony until weekly Le Point broke the news in its latest edition.
Poster Comment:
Macron was a Rothschild employee before becoming President.