“Faced with the emotion aroused by the murder of Philippine, nothing is worse than brandishing false answers”

Ino point in procrastinating. With the rape and murder of Philippine, a 19-year-old student, whose body was found on Saturday, September 21, in the Bois de Boulogne, rarely has the news served the purposes of an interior minister in search justification for a new turn of the screw on immigration.

If Taha O., the 22-year-old undocumented Moroccan arrested three days later in Geneva, Switzerland, is indeed the perpetrator, it is undeniable that this femicide could have been avoided. On condition that the young man, already convicted of rape, could have been kept in detention until Morocco issued the consular pass (LPC) allowing his expulsion. Hence the seemingly logical conclusion aimed at advocating the extension of the detention period for foreigners awaiting deportation to the border, as desired by Bruno Retailleau’s Les Républicains friends.

In fact, if regulating or legislating under the influence of the – understandable – anger of public opinion is not good policy, doing nothing seems unbearable. We still need to act rationally and effectively. For thirty years, governments of the right and the left have continued to lengthen the time during which a foreigner can be detained while awaiting the organization of their removal: set at ten days by the Pasqua law in 1993, this duration detention increased to twelve days in 1998 with the Chevènement law, then to thirty-two with the Sarkozy law of 2003, to forty-five days with the Besson law, in 2011, then to ninety days with the law Columbus of 2018.

A possible Retailleau law, aligning this duration with those, significantly longer, in force in several European countries would undoubtedly appease part of public opinion. But nothing says that it would prevent the repetition of a similar tragedy. Nor that it would make it possible to improve the derisory rate (around 10%) of execution of deportations at the border which fuels the far-right vote.

When faced with emotion and anger, nothing is worse than offering false answers that feed the resentment machine. Like the idea that restricting the social rights of foreigners will reduce the flow of arrivals.

However, real levers for change exist. It’s about clearly designating them and putting yourself in a position to activate them. This has often been said, but in vain: rather than issuing outright obligations to leave French territory (OQTF) targeting people who are impossible to expel, because they have, for example, potentially French children or are nationals of countries at war, we should focus on the offenders and the chain of judicial and administrative decisions leading to their expulsion.

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