The new “TVA Nouvelles 22h” announcer, Pierre-Olivier Zappa, is back on an episode of QUB Radio’s “L’apéro piquant” about the controversy that arose last year after a question he posed to the CEO of Air Canada about it. Fluency in French.
Last November, with one question, Pierre-Olivier Zappa managed to create a political, social, and identity tidal wave that resonated both regionally and federally. His questioning to Michael Rousseau about his use and knowledge of French led to a revival of the French language debate in Montreal, as well as in large Canadian companies subject to the Official Languages Act.
The 34-year-old journalist, who had not been interested in economics at all for a few years, famously asked the question “How can you live in Montreal for over 14 years and speak broken French?” To the CEO of Air Canada as he left the room as he just addressed the Metropolitan Montreal Board of Commerce.
/// ///
Pierre-Olivier Zappa admitted into the microphone of Sophie Duroucher and Richard Martineau that he was first surprised to get an answer from Mr. Rousseau – and that it resonated internationally. To tell the truth, Pierre-Olivier Zappa did not expect CEO Rousseau to answer journalists’ questions, given that his predecessor was accustomed to prevarication.
When approached to host À vos affairs on LCN, the journalist had trouble understanding his bosses’ motivations, he said while recording the podcast. He said that economics did not appeal to him at all and that he preferred politics very much – a subject in which he studied.
I asked them if it was a suggestion or an assumption: Do I have a choice? And they told me, “No, you don’t have a choice,” he explained with a laugh, adding that he thanked them today for making that decision because his view of the economy has completely changed and it’s now his favorite subject.
Prior to working in the media as a journalist, Pierre-Olivier Zappa also taught at a high school on Montreal’s south shore, when he was completing his master’s degree.
He entered the school where his wife worked as a drama teacher, but with professional exhaustion and sick leave that followed each other within the faculty, he soon found himself with 125% of the assignments. Then he was assigned to high school class 2 and 3 students on their way to drop out.
“There have been cases where young people between the ages of 12 and 13 can decide that they are going to leave school. I have always liked school and didn’t understand why. So I am very interested in them. I was doing TV ‘programs’ for them, in class, to get them interested in school. He was captured during his visit to the Apéro piquant.
“I only had one class, but I experienced what teachers feel as a pride, to see where the young people I’ve taught have come. Hats off to the teachers.”
