June 20, 2002	Thursday	Rabi-us-Sani 8, 1423

PARIS, June 19: French Veterans Affairs Minister Hamlaoui Mekachera, a Muslim, has come under severe criticism from his own community.

Mekachera, 71, is a French citizen of Algerian descent and president of the all-powerful National Council of French Muslim.

One of the criticisms levelled against Mekachera is that he’s not a Harki, but an Algerian who was already, at the time of the Algerian rebellion, a French military officer. Critics say he is not at all well-placed to understand the problems of France’s Harki population.

As far as Mekachera is concerned, he defines the problem as one of ‘recognition’. He says “it’s a recognition on the part of the French that should be as much material as moral.”

But, as far as representatives of the Harki community are concerned, Mekachera’s appointment is not only symbolic, it’s also in a way somewhat ‘awkward’.

At least that is what Salah Baadache, a representative of the Collectif des Harkis du Var, claims when he points out that “all that the French government is doing is attempting to make up for lost time, for something they should have done a long time ago.”