The decision was made this Wednesday by the Board of Directors of the organizing association of the festival. According to the organizer, CinéBastide, no support from the new municipal majority will be accepted.
“The principles of the National Rally are incompatible with the values that underpin this event,” said the Board of Directors of the organizing association, CinéBastide, for the International Political Film Festival of Carcassonne (FIFP) announced on Wednesday that they do not want to be subsidized by the city, which has recently shifted to the far right.
In a statement published on the festival’s Facebook page on April 15, the organizers explained that they have withdrawn their subsidy request from the municipality led by Christophe Barthès.
The CinéBastide association emphasizes that since the festival’s creation in 2018, the event “seeks to offer cinema that questions the life of the City in all its complexity, allowing for nuance and the heterogeneity of perspectives.”
Described as “deeply attached to the values of tolerance, freedom, and inclusion,” the festival contributes to “an open cultural life, attentive to the diversity of perspectives and stories from around the world” with programming that “has never ceased to fight against all forms of discrimination.”
Without this subsidy, the FIFP loses an input of nearly 10,000 euros for the organization of its event, approximately 5% of its total budget.
Despite this, the future of the festival is not in jeopardy, with the economic model relying mainly on self-financing and private funding.
In their statement, the organizers affirm that “the FIFP will not only continue to exist but intends to grow and develop to meet the demands of an increasingly larger audience.”
The dates for the 9th edition of the festival planned for January 2027 will be announced soon.
