“Nahel could have been my little brother”: the open letter of Tchouaméni after the death of the teenager

2023-06-29 00:09:43

After Kylian Mbappé and Jules Koundé on Tuesday, new personalities from the world of football continue to be indignant and to pay tribute to Nahel, 17, shot dead Tuesday in Nanterre (Hauts-de-Seine) by a police officer following a refusal to comply. This Wednesday evening, Aurélien Tchouaméni, midfielder for the France team and Real Madrid published a long “open letter” on social networks.

“Nahel could have been my little brother, he begins. And I’m heartbroken when I hear his mother because it’s my mother’s voice that I hear. He is aware of this, posting this message on social networks will not “rewrite history”, nor “change the world”, but the 23-year-old player questions himself.

“I would like to understand why for years, young people have died during police checks that seem trivial, he continues. Understand why the trigger seems much less heavy when it comes to a certain type of individuals. Understand why a video had to come out so that the case was not covered up”.

Immediately after the incident, the biker from the Directorate of Public Order and Traffic (DOPC) claimed that he had placed himself in front of the yellow Mercedes driven by the teenager to stop him, and that he had tried to flee by rushing at him. But his version is undermined by images filmed and broadcast on social networks. It shows the biker holding the young driver at gunpoint, before shooting point-blank when the car speeds off again, without trying to hit him.

Nahel could have been my little brother. And I’m heartbroken when I hear his mother because it’s my mother’s voice that I hear.

We won’t make history and we won’t change the world on social networks… pic.twitter.com/MmVzUC0mRh

— Tchouameni Aurélien (@atchouameni) June 28, 2023

“In France, the Fraternity must still mean something”

“Hate threatens to divide us,” continues the player. It can make us forget that the vast majority of police officers carry out their mission with respect for fundamental rights and sometimes in very difficult conditions”. And asks himself: “what to do? Social networks are noisy for a while. Then we resume the course of our lives until another mother, another family wakes up one morning to learn that one of their own is gone. If you have a miracle recipe, I am willing to take it. I don’t have one,” he admits.

While recalling that he is aware that “the use of force by the police is not necessarily illegal”, the midfielder insists: “the central question lies in the middle ground between legitimacy and illegality. of the use of force. (…) It is essential to restore the confidence of citizens in their police, that any absence of justice incites doubt on the action of the forces of order”. “Because Nahel was our little brother, concludes Aurélien Tchouaméni. And in France, the Fraternity must still mean something”.

Shortly before him, Paul Pogba had also published a message, demanding that “Justice be done”. “Rest in peace Nahel, my condolences to his mom and his family. No one deserves to die at 17 let alone for refusing to comply,” he wrote on Twitter.

Rest in peace Nahel, my condolences to his mom and his family.

Nobody deserves to die at 17 and even less for a refusal to comply..

Let justice be done.

— Paul Pogba (@paulpogba) June 28, 2023

“We cannot tolerate situations like the one that happened yesterday with Naël, abounded the Parisian Achraf Hakimi. My condolences to his family and friends. Rest in peace, kid.”