Photos of Emmanuel Macron’s sports minister planting a kiss close to his neck at the Olympic Games opening ceremony have caused a stir in France.
Gabriel Attal, Mr Macron’s prime minister, can be seen looking the other way as Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, 46, embraced the French president.
“Attal doesn’t know where to look,” one commentator pointed out.
“The French have fallen in love with the Games,” Ms Oudéa-Castéra told CNews after 85 per cent said they viewed the opening ceremony as a triumph. A similar amount thought the Olympics overall were a success.
“They’ll be talking about it for the next 100 years,” Mr Macron added after the opening ceremony.
Clearly swept away by the emotion of it all, Ms Oudéa-Castéra, a former professional tennis player, appeared locked in a close embrace with the 46-year-old president, sparking controversy in the French media and online.
Madame Figaro, the French magazine which first drew attention to the photo, called it a “curious kiss” and pointed out that the minister “certainly knows how to get people talking about her”.
Midi Libre wrote: “After the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games, the pressure was off, giving way to euphoria. In an explosion of joy, sports minister Amélie Oudéa-Castera and President Emmanuel Macron kissed. The kiss caused quite a stir.”
Online commentators were also quick to spot a potential controversy. “What’s this kiss between Oudéa and Macron??!” wrote one commentator. “Brigitte won’t like it,” wrote another.
Some were more critical. “I find this photo indecent, it’s not worthy of a president and a minister.”
“Woah! That’s what I call team building. When I kiss a colleague, she doesn’t hook the back of my neck,” said another.
Others pointed to other photos of her kissing athletes in similar fashion, insisting she was just passionate about the Games.
Ms Oudéa-Castera has courted controversy in recent months.
Mr Macron had given her the double responsibility of sports and education minister but he was forced to drop the latter post after she caused uproar by saying she had taken her daughter out of a state elementary school and put her into an exclusive private one because of a chronic “lack of supply teachers”.
Ahead of the Games, Ms Oudéa-Castera appeared in a full wetsuit with a bathing cap and dived into the Seine to demonstrate it was safe for swimming.
However, the men’s triathlon event scheduled to take place on Tuesday morning had to be postponed because of pollution. Storms forecast for Tuesday tonight threaten to scupper the event altogether.
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