For Auvergne tobacconists, the year 2025 begins as 2024 ended: with a news item. The tobacco shop in the town center of Blanzat (Puy-de-Dôme) was the target of an armed robbery this Saturday, January 4. At gunpoint, the manager of the establishment was forced to let two individuals take cartons of cigarettes. Their stolen vehicle was found in an accident a few kilometers away, in the municipality of Volvic (Puy-de-Dôme), but no perpetrator was arrested in the days that followed. “Now, there are direct attacks on tobacconists who fear working in insecurity,” regrets Vincent Charbonnel, president of the Puy-de-Dôme tobacconists’ federation.
For Auvergnat, this new incident is a continuation of a record year 2024. “We have had around forty burglaries even though there are less than 300 tobacconists in the department! It’s completely exploded and people are really fed up,” he insists. During the last theft of the year, on the night of December 6 to 7 in Saint-Germain-Lembron (Puy-de-Dôme), around 2,000 euros of tobacco were stolen.
Faced with such figures, the Puydôme tobacconist presents several explanations, starting with the increase in the price of tobacco. “It artificially creates an illegal parallel market and it is fueled by these burglaries,” he maintains. “We can see this clearly in Blanzat, because they focused on the cartons of cigarettes which will give them significant loot. And I think that there is impunity among robbers or burglars, they feel that there will be no serious punishment against them. There are strong statements against drug trafficking, so I think that some drug trafficking actors say that they will overlook cigarette trafficking. »
Present this Monday in Blanzat alongside Pascale Rodrigo, the sub-prefect of Riom, Vincent Charbonnel expressed his dismay to the State representative: “There is anger rising against the State because we are not does not feel protected. Should we wait for someone to die? My big fear is that one day there will be one. »
