Almost nine months after the kidnapping of journalist Olivier Dubois by a jihadist group in Mali, the family of the only French hostage in the world posted a petition online Thursday evening to demand his release. The text received this Sunday the support of Omar Sy. “Olivier is a 47-year-old son, brother, friend and father, He is the ONLY French hostage in the world, since 8/4/21. The situation is URGENT. Thanks for him, ”the“ Lupine ”actor tweeted.
The petition, visible on the site Change.org, aims to “alert French citizens of the situation and challenge the French and Malian heads of state on his case and demand his release,” the family wrote in a statement. “We don’t know anything. This lack of information and this silence are unbearable on a daily basis, while Olivier is in an emergency situation, ”lamented the journalist’s mother, his sister Canèle Bernard and her spouse. “Our multiple requests for a meeting with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jean-Yves Le Drian, in order to obtain concrete elements on the steps taken to release Olivier remain unanswered. “
“The mobilization must not weaken,” also alerted the editorial staff of the daily Liberation on Saturday, with whom Olivier Dubois is used to working, explaining that he “had not seen any significant progress” on the subject of the journalist’s release.
This late Sunday afternoon, the petition collected more than 10,000 signatures.
“Response devoid of any empathy”
“At the end of December 2021, for the first time the (French) Presidency finally answered us, through its Chief of Staff, that State services pay the greatest attention to the evolution of Olivier’s situation (…), An unsatisfactory response devoid of any empathy and eluding any action taken, ”said the journalist’s family.
“In 2022, when the two presidential elections will take place in France as in Mali and that the fight against terrorism remains at the heart of these campaigns, this silence with regard to Olivier is all the more astonishing”, writes- her in the online petition.
The 47-year-old freelance journalist, living and working in Mali since 2015, himself announced his kidnapping in a video posted on social media on May 5, explaining that he was kidnapped on April 8 in Gao, in northern Mali, by the Support Group for Islam and Muslims (GSIM), the main jihadist alliance in the Sahel, linked to Al-Qaeda. Since the release in October 2020 of Sophie Pétronin, a septuagenarian kidnapped in December 2016 in Gao also, Olivier Dubois is the only French hostage abroad.