Marc Perelman is an architect and university professor of aesthetics in Paris Nanterre. He is the author of Le Football, an emotional plague (Folio, 2006) and Smart stadium (L'Échappée, 2016).
"Obsolete, overwhelmed, disconnected from reality" , the rostrum of former Olympic champion and sports minister Guy Drut was like a "missile" launched in the head of the officials of the Olympic Games in Paris 2024 at the worst time of the covid-19 health crisis.
Towards the postponement of the 2024 Olympic Games?
The victory of Paris 2024 was above all to be that of the current representatives of the Seine Saint-Denis, like Stéphane Troussel (Socialist President of the Conseil département) who just said "no" to the postponement of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games; or of Patrick Braouezec (future ex-President of Plaine commune), communist according to the seasons, old driver of the sports sites of the 9-3 who begins slowly to consider, for his part, the postponement of the Olympics. Nicolas Bonnet-Oulaldj (currently elected PCF of Paris) considers, for his part, that "we must postpone the Olympic Games in Paris 2024". As for Tony Estanguet who obviously accused the blow coming from his alter ego of the IOC, he wants to “rehallenge” the Olympic Games, to save money by “pooling ” the vehicles that will transport the athletes and the media. He admits all the same that the health crisis will " induce additional costs ", like the Minister of Sports Roxana Maracineanu who announces that there will be "probably [...] cost overruns" . We were however promised that it would not be… “The budget is closed!” For his part, Bernard Thibault, former general secretary of the Cgt, member of the International Labor Organization (ILO) and at the same time the board of directors of the OCOG and the Solideo (Company for the Delivery of Olympic Works), a staunch supporter of Paris Olympics 2024 in the name of a mythical old working-class solidarity with Baron Coubertin's Olympism, is ready - without paying too much attention to the details - to send workers back to the building sites as part of the Social Charter signed by five workers' unions and three employers' organizations.
The IOC has nothing planned to fight against the coronavirus apart from the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics in 2021.Linked in fact to the Coronavirus pandemic, Guy Drut's declaration had such an impact that it divided political and administrative officials on the conduct to be followed for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. It shattered the consensus between the various political leaders of Seine Saint-Denis and even beyond. It blew up the beautiful promises to accelerate urban renewal through the famous “legacy” of “sustainable”, “ecological ” Olympic Games , to use the official sabir.
Before describing the social situation in Seine Saint-Denis, we will note that among all the projects linked to the Olympic Games, the leitmotif of “heritage” taken up in choir, never evokes constructions or renovations of cultural infrastructures (libraries , bookstores, art center) or even educational places or even nearby facilities (simple pools for learning to swim), no more the necessary renovation of many worship buildings (churches) and public buildings. The IOC has been “ generous” with Notre-Dame to be one of the hostage buildings of the Olympic decorum but it has never planned anything to fight against the coronavirus apart from the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 .
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Seine Saint-Denis: the lasting myth of job creation thanks to the Olympic Games
Between 119,000 and 247,000 jobs, according to sources, would be created over 20 years, or between 6,000 and 12,000 jobs per year. Nothing extraordinary and low-skilled, short-lived jobs that do not affect the Seine Saint-Denis. Only the world of sport, that of the sports industry and especially of tourism would do well (or rather the Games), by supporting the new strategic development axis of the Seine Saint-Denis Departmental Council linked to sport (stays , hotels, shops, restaurant, leisure places…). The creation for the OCOG of 4,000 jobs, over several years until 2024, is mainly acquired by graduates of business and law schools, and marginally for university sports fields. On the other hand, it is indeed 70,000 volunteers (the young people of Seine Saint-Denis?) Who will provide free reception for tourists in total contradiction with French labor legislation.
The Olympic Games are a social centrifuge.As for the construction for the Olympic village of 17,000 rooms planned for sportsmen only who will be converted after the Olympics into 2,000 homes including 900 student rooms, you should know that there will be a first financial cost for the construction of these rooms then a second cost for their transformation into apartments. The same applies to the media village (1,500 housing units). Who will pay the additional bill? As a reminder, the London Olympic Village (2012) welcomed 2,818 new dwellings, of which between 700 and 1,379 were social dwellings. But when renting, you have to pay at least 2,500 € for a small two-room apartment. Rents jumped 25% in a few months in a former suburb rather poor (Stratford) due to real estate speculation directly linked to the Olympics. Many of these dwellings are still empty. And we also know that London was a ghost town during the Olympic Games, Olympic tourism having replaced tourism of visits to museums and sites ... What population will come to live in these brand new accommodation along the Seine?
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Especially in Seine Saint-Denis there are planned expropriation measures: 25 companies (public works, archives, caterers, etc.), a school of osteopaths, or around 1,600 employees, a home for migrants wiped off the map, the high school. Professional Marcel-Cachin moved, the refectory and the boarding school of the Supméca engineering school must be razed. The violent real estate speculation will benefit, as usual, households whose financial capacities are far beyond those of current populations. The Olympic Games are a social centrifuge. Poor people are systematically far from their neighborhoods of origin. There are many recent examples: Athens (2004), London (2012), Sochi (2014), Rio (2016). All these host cities of the Olympic Games not only leave sports facilities and stadiums fallow, but also, very often, half-empty Olympic villages, accelerating the deficits, the increase in public debts and GDP. The post-Olympic Games always accumulates frustration, resentment, resentment and great disillusionment.
From 1998 to 2024: the slow abandonment of the Seine Saint-Denis
We do not see why what "1998" (World Cup football) did not succeed, the Olympics would succeed. There are even more unemployed people in Seine-Saint-Denis today than there were 20 years ago, especially among young people; 30% of households live below the poverty line; 1,000 children (Aubervilliers) are in emergency accommodation; infant mortality is 40% to 50% higher than in the rest of the country (the Covid-19 pandemic was very strong, causing proportionately more deaths in the population than in other departments); the State spends 47% less on educating a pupil in Seine-Saint-Denis than on a pupil in the city of Paris; violence is everywhere, in cities, in schools and in particular in hospitals, with theft, destruction, damage, attacks on the physical integrity of individuals not to mention areas of lawlessness. According to the report by deputies François Cornut-Gentille (LR) and Rodrigue Kokouendo (LaREM), people in an irregular situation are present there between “150,000, 250,000 or even 400,000”… Even today, 50% of those under 12 years can not swim. Contrary to what beautiful souls like P. Braouezec think, jobs, Olympic swimming pools and new housing will never be acquired by the resident population. Unless one agrees with the words of Patricia Pelloux (former head of sites and infrastructure at the OCOG): "What is good for athletes is good for future residents."
Olympic Games: the sporting town planning of the Seine Saint-Denis
The aim is to transform the Seine Saint-Denis department into “a leading Olympic territory ” according to Stéphane Troussel, to promote “[…] on the scale of the departmental territory the practice of daily sport in space public. The concept of “sports street” is particularly suitable for tackling the challenges of urban integration of outdoor sports practices ” . These are "200 million euros that the Department will mobilize between 2016 and 2024 to sustainably transform the Seine-Saint-Denis ". Everything is therefore organized, oriented and channeled under the injunction of the Olympic Games and their improbable "heritage". How can the poorest department in France implement such a large budget and social guidelines for the sole purpose of competitive sport?
While some are considering postponing the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, more and more of us want to cancel them.
