Few Reasons To Cheer

Rachid Nekkaz was back on his home turf in the Parisian banlieue of Choisy-le-Roi last month with a timely message for the neighborhood's largely black and Arab population. "Get yourselves on the electoral lists!" his spokesman declared through a bullhorn over the din of market criers in the [an error occurred while processing this directive] crowded morning bazaar. "Nekkaz, son of Choisy-le-Roi, is running for President!" The gangly son of illiterate Algerian immigrants, now a successful Internet entrepreneur, doesn't entertain hopes of winning against the likes of Ségolène Royal, Nicolas Sarkozy and Jean-Marie Le Pen. He'll be lucky to get even 3% of the vote.

But as the sole presidential candidate to come from these forgotten quarters of France, Nekkaz, 34, is trying to address one of the most glaring failings of the French political system: the systematic underrepresentation of visible minorities. Nekkaz and his organization, Club des Elus Allez France, have registered 63,000 new voters in the last six months, and he says he's just getting started. By his reckoning, 15-25% of potential voters in the poor suburbs around Paris aren't registered. His pitch for involvement, if not for the presidency, captures the imagination of Rose N'Daw, 63, who works as a cook in a relative's Senegalese restaurant nearby. "We need people around here to start expressing themselves," she says. "We need to do something. We need a little hope. And maybe we need to bang on the table."

A year ago, in neglected neighborhoods on the edge of cities and towns throughout France, young rioters banged on more than tables. Burning cars, vandalizing schools and looting stores, they lent a hard edge of crisis to the long-obvious fact that many among the poor ethnic minorities in the banlieues feel excluded from France's economic and political life. Better schools, better housing and more jobs are all vital elements of bridging the yawning gap, as politicians of all parties have piously noted. But precious few among those pols are minorities themselves. There is not a single member of France's National Assembly of Arab or black origin; nor is a single mayor in France, even in the suburban communities ringing Paris and other French cities where descendants of post-war immigrants are concentrated.