Hundreds of people were deported on July 16, 2024 in preparation for the Paris Olympic Games. – © NnoMan Cadoret / Reporterre
Hundreds of people were deported on July 16, 2024 in preparation for the Paris Olympic Games. – © NnoMan Cadoret / Reporterre
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During the Olympic Games (JO) of Paris, 256 places were found to accommodate people in very precarious situations. A positive assessment, presented as a « social heritage » by Emmanuel Macron. A result which, however, omits the approximately 20,000 people expelled from their informal living space during the games period in Île-de-France, between May and September 2024.
This assessment was revealed by the collective Le Revers de la miel, in a report published on November 4. Among these 20,000 people expelled, more than 4,550 were minors ; This is three times more children expelled than in 2021-2022. The locations targeted were varied: groups of tents, squats, caravans or simple boxes placed on the ground. Without a direct link with the Olympic sites, these expulsions responded more to a political desire to « cleaning »with the aim of restoring the image of the country, erasing the most fragile from the public space, writes the collective.
Added to these expulsions are dramatic consequences for families, often disconnected from social support networks and exposed to increasing police repression. Only 36 % of evacuations resulted in offers of temporary accommodation ; the others were on the contrary accompanied by so-called urban developments « deterrents » — furniture against the homeless. For the collective, these expulsions illustrate the chronic incapacity of the authorities to tackle the structural causes of exclusion, despite the example of the 256 people rehoused, which only reinforces the idea that « when the State wants, it can ».
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