Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday awarded the insignia of Knight of the National Order of Merit to Ali Akbar, the last street newspaper vendor in Paris, a "magnificent example" of integration "that makes our country stronger and prouder".

"Very moved," this Pakistani man, over 70 years old, who arrived in France when he was only twenty, explained that he already had in mind the fake newspaper headline he would shout in the coming days, he who likes to proclaim parody headlines: "That's it, I'm a knight! I did it!"

"You are the accent of the 6th arrondissement. The voice of the French press," the head of state told him in the reception hall of the Élysée, paying tribute to this key figure of the Saint-Germain-des-Prés district.

He stressed that after facing "poverty, forced labor, violence" in his country of birth, "French soil" had given him "hope for a better life".

"This is a magnificent example at a time when we so often hear the bad winds"... "there are also many stories like Ali's being written, of women and men who fled poverty to choose a country of freedom and who have built a life there that makes our country stronger and prouder," the president insisted.

- "Tricolor Irreverence" -

From his early days as a town crier in the 1970s, thanks to a meeting with Georges Bernier, known as "Professor Choron", who offered him the opportunity to sell his satirical newspapers Hara-Kiri and Charlie Hebdo, Ali Akbar set his sights on the Sciences Po district.

There, he recounts having met many students who have since become ministers or members of parliament. Even president of the Republic, like Emmanuel Macron.

Slender, with a thin face, newspapers tucked under his arm—mostly Le Monde these days—he still roams the streets of the capital's Left Bank, reciting humorous headlines. A way of parodying political events with a smile.

French has "become your language", "you are learning to play with it, thereby making your own a form of tricolor irreverence", the head of state whispered to him.

"You have carried, if I may say so, the world on your shoulders and France in your heart," he added, with a nod to the evening newspaper.

Fifty years ago, Paris had around forty newspaper vendors shouting their wares, stationed in strategic locations such as metro entrances. He distinguished himself by choosing to wander about and then, in the 1980s, by starting to invent parody... and sensationalist headlines.

He receives a pension of 1,000 euros per month but continues to work from 3 PM to 10 PM. In this digital age, he sells an average of thirty newspapers per day, compared to 150 to 200 in his early days.

And now? "I asked them to find me a place here!", Ali Akbar jokes. "No, I'm going to stay, I'm going to continue selling newspapers," and "entertain people with my jokes."