Malek Boutih

In anticipation of the 2017 Legislative elections, he sought nomination as a candidate for La République en marche !. The nomination was refused and he competed in the election as an independent. He was eliminated in the first round with 12.39% of the vote.

In 2016, he received the Prix de la laïcité ("Secular Prize").

In February 2015 the Prime Minister Manuel Valls named Malek Boutih as parliamentarian assigned to consider the analysis and prevention of "new generations turning to terrorism in connection with jihadist networks". This report was handed over in June 2015, titled Génération radicale ("Radical Generation"). One of its major conclusions was:

Malek Boutih was chosen as a candidate in Essonne's 10th constituency following a vote of party members. He began his campaign using the words and images of Jean-Luc Mélenchon and in his campaign materials, despite Mélenchon supporting François Delapierre, the candidate for the Left Front in the same constituency. He led in the first round on 10 June 2012 with 34.56% of the vote and was elected on 17 June with 56.84% of the vote against the Radical Party candidate, Marianne Duranton (43.16%).

Since the Treaty of Lisbon came into force on 1 December 2009, there has been a legal basis for the protection of "rights of persons belonging to minorities" in Europe.

He was not reappointed to the National Secretariat of the party in December 2008 and was summoned on 25 January 2009 by Pouria Amirshahi to clarify his attitude after his criticisms of the party's plan for the financial crisis and his numerous accolades of Nicolas Sarkozy. "Malek Boutih should choose which side he's on."

Close to Julien Dray, also a former member of SOS Racisme, he supported Ségolène Royal as Socialist Party candidate in the 2007 French Presidential election. The new President, Nicolas Sarkozy, asked him to join his government, which he refused to do, affirming that there was no question of him "taking responsibilities in this government", all the while underlining "the reciprocal respect" which characterised his relationship with Nicolas Sarkozy.

Almost all of the elected Socialists in the department made publicly known their hostility to his candidature and their willingness to block him since he was parachuted into the position. The First Federal Secretary had effectively organised a consultative vote in the constituency between candidates Martine Pinville and Jeanne Filloux, before Malek Boutih's appointment. Selected by the local party members, Martine Pinville chose to keep her candidature with the official support of the Socialist Party, thus she was excluded at the national committee meeting of 22 May 2007, along with her alternate candidate, the outgoing Socialist deputy Jean-Claude Beauchaud.

In his report on drug addiction, Cannabis : contrôler l'usage pour protéger les citoyens (2006) ("Cannabis: Controlling usage to protect citizens"), Malek Boutih advocates taking public control of the market so as to combat the mafia, cannabis being, according to him, "the cornerstone of ghettoisation and insecurity in working-class neighbourhoods". This idea was taken into the platform of the Socialist Party in 2007 in the form of "public regulation".

Malek Boutih was chosen as candidate for the Charente's 4th constituency in the 2007 Legislative elections on 1 July 2006 at the national congress of the Socialist Party.

He wrote a report on immigration, Une nouvelle politique de l'immigration (2004) ("A new politics of immigration"), called for by the national leadership of the party to define an official line on the subject. His goal was to convince the public that immigration was an essential contribution to France when it was properly controlled and organised. He declared himself in favour of quotas in line with a strategy of codevelopment creating a legal stream of immigration and regulating flows of migrants. This report was distributed by the Socialist Party leadership.

A regular critic of its elder, rival anti-racism organisation MRAP, in 2003 Malek Boutih declared "that there are several kinds of anti-racism in France, notable that of MRAP who march to cries of 'Death to the Jews!'". In September 2006, he was convicted, fined €1,000 and order to pay €1 damages by the Paris tribunal correctionel for defamation of MRAP.

His time as head of SOS Racisme was marked by the creation of the discrimination test and the first convictions in cases against racial discrimination in employment, housing and entry to night clubs. His greatest triumph being the validation of the use of discrimination tests by the Court of Cassation. In the fight against racism and its rooks, he focussed on education at tackled urban ghettos with two priorities: mixing the population and fighting against violence. Finally, in 2002 he was one of the first to sound the alarm on the rise of anti-semitism in France, in the guise of anti-Zionism.

He received the medal of a knight of the National Order of Merit in 2001. In 2003, he received the prize awarded by the Senate for 'political discovery of the year'.

On 6 February 1990, he appeared on the TV talk show Ciel, mon mardi !, a program that specialised in confrontation between people with opposing views.

A member of the Socialist Party since 1986, when his leadership of SOS Racisme ended he was appointed to the party's national hierarchy at the 2003 Congress of Dijon as National Secretary for Social Issues, a post that did not previously exist, despite never having had an elected position. The post was renewed at the Le Mans Congress in 2005. He had responsibility for immigration, the fight against racism, AIDS and drug addiction.

He also has had a long association with SOS Racisme, a civil rights organisation with close ties to the Socialist Party. He joined in 1984 while a student at the University of Nanterre and served as Vice President from 1985 to 1992 and as President from 1999 to 2003. Boutih is known for his honesty and generosity; he is appreciated on both sides of the aisle for his patriotism and frankness. President Nicolas Sarkozy asked him to enter the French Government in 2007 but he refused, preferring to focus on his social activism.

At the beginning of his study of Law at the University of Nanterre and at the École supérieure de journalism de Paris, he became involved in activism and community work. In 1983 he took part in the March for Equality and Against Racism. Joining SOS Racisme in 1984, he became its vice-president from 1985 to 1992 and founded the Grigny Maison des Potes ("mate's house" — emergency accommodation) and the Banlieues du Monde association. He was editor-in-chief of the newspaper Pote à Pote ("Mate to Mate") for several years.

He felt that he had been beaten by his own party and severely criticised its leaders "who formed a clique that disliked society as it was, who cannot see themselves as part of it and who cling to the melancholy of the 1970s. Where we come from it's Good Bye Lenin!" He rebuked them for having skimmed over the debate on diversity and not having taken it up seriously, like other subjects of real concern to French people: violence, work, the right to social emancipation, identity.

Abdelmalek "Malek" Boutih (French pronunciation: ​[malɛk buˈti] ; born 27 October 1964) is a French retired politician and activist who served as a member of the National Assembly from 2012 to 2017, representing the Essonne department. He previously was the Socialist Party's National Secretary for Social Issues (French: Secrétaire national chargé des questions de société) from 2003 to 2008.