Maboula Soumahoro is a renowned French scholar and public intellectual. The holder of a PhD earned through studies both in France and at Columbia University in the US, she is an associate professor at the University of Tours, a specialist on the African diaspora, and one of France’s foremost academics when it comes to race relations.

So when the European parliament decided to invite her to an internal event last month as part of a dialogue to discuss ways to “promote equality and inclusion in the workplace”, it made perfect sense.

But the event never happened. First, the French far-right MEP Mathilde Androuët wrote to Roberta Metsola, the president of the parliament, seeking the cancellation of the event on the basis that Soumahoro had made statements with racist undertones and casting doubt on her expertise. Then the French far-right MEP, Marion Maréchal, formerly a member of the National Rally, led by her aunt, Marine Le Pen, weighed in, stepping up the pressure with a post on X that denounced Soumahoro in even more forceful terms as “an anti-White speaker”.

Maréchal’s criticisms would be laughable if they had not been so successful. In less than 24 hours the far right had, according to the French news organisation Mediapart, managed to have the event cancelled.