Since the cyclone, Mayotte has faced severe water shortages, with much of the territory also experiencing network outages.
“You have lived a terrible life. Everyone is fighting, no matter the color of your skin,” Macron was seen telling the crowd. “Don’t pit people against each other…I’m happy to be part of France, because I can tell you that if I wasn’t in France, I would have been 10,000 times worse.”
Mr Macron was reacting to a comment by a Mahoran woman who accused him of “coming to us to say everything is okay when everything is not okay”. The clip does not show her discussing Mayotte’s status as a French region or its demographic composition.
Another video released by BFMTV shows Mr Macron being booed and urged to resign.
The East African archipelago of the Comoros gained independence from France in 1975, but a year later Mayotte, one of the archipelago islands, voted to remain in France in a referendum hosted by Paris. UN resolutions do not recognize French sovereignty over the island.
Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally party, which pledges to stop immigration from the Comoros to Mayotte, has become the island’s most popular political party in recent years.
Sebastien Chênes, a spokesperson for the National Assembly, said Mr Macron was unlikely to “console” Mayotte residents who “always feel that they are treated differently”. Clementine Autin, an influential left-wing lawmaker, described Macron’s words as a “neo-colonial speech unbecoming of a president.”
