While the elected officials of Seine-Saint-Denis have planned to demonstrate this Wednesday, October 13 Place Vauban (7th), not far from the Hotel Matignon to denounce the displacement of drug addicts at Porte de la Villette, the socialist mayor of the capital Anne Hidalgo and the prefect of police Didier Lallement again passed the ball on the subject to the Council of Paris.
“I find this trip absolutely scandalous,” said the socialist mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, this Wednesday, October 13, referring to the evacuation on September 24 of drug addicts from the Jardins d’Eole (18th) in the square de the Porte de la Villette (19th) and deploring that this displacement of the population is “the only response of the public authorities”.
THE ball in the court of the State?
And if the Parisian councilor was delighted “that the government has decided” in favor of the opening of new treatment centers for drug addicts in great disgrace, she nevertheless assured that it was now “in the State to make proposals “about a” question which rather falls within the competence of the Minister of the Interior [Gérald Darmanin, ndlr]”. “We have to work harder,” she concluded.
In front of her, the Paris police prefect, Didier Lallement, replied that “the State had not received any proposals” and considered that “the fight against crack [était] quite level ”in Paris, listing the arrests and welcoming the closure of“ 11 kitchens ”where crack balls are made. And if, according to him, this fight against crack “could be superior”, it cannot be “only police”, but “above all medical and social”.
The current situation at the Porte de la Villette square “cannot be a lasting situation. […] with no other presence than the police presence ”, adds Didier Lallement, who calls for“ finding other solutions ”and said he was“ ready to look at them and consider them ”. “For the moment, we have no answer [de l’Etat] on the health issue, ”recalled Anne Souyris, the Parisian assistant in charge of public health.
the elected officials of 93 in front of matignon
While waiting for the opening of these reception centers and the long-term care of drug addicts in Paris, the residents of the Place Auguste Baron, the Square de la Villette and the inhabitants of Pantin and Aubervilliers (93) continue to demonstrate their anger. This Wednesday, the mayor (UDI) of Aubervilliers Karine Franclet and the mayor (PS) of Pantin Bertrand Kern called for a new mobilization not in La Villette, but a stone’s throw from Matignon.
Together, they denounce the anchoring of drug addicts on a site which was supposed to be only a “temporary solution” according to the Paris police headquarters. “The facilities seem more and more sustainable, the place being identified as a point of sale. Meanwhile, crack addicts come and go in the surrounding streets. […] vandalizing building entrances, cellars, car windows … ”, they testify.
And “since the mobilizations in the 19th, Aubervilliers and Pantin are not heard, we have decided to come together to be heard”, jointly warned these two elected, who therefore planned to meet at Place Vauban on Wednesday, in 6.30 p.m. There, they will reiterate their request to be received by Prime Minister Jean Castex launched two weeks ago already, which had never received a response.