Will we ever know with precision what happened on the evening of April 15, 2019, under the framework of Notre-Dame de Paris?
And to what to attribute the departure of the flames which ravaged the building?
While the judicial investigation is still ongoing, the president of the Court of Auditors Pierre Moscovici set foot in the dish on Wednesday.
"
It would have been necessary to launch an administrative investigation in the wake
", he launched, during the presentation of a report on the conservation and the restoration of the cathedral.
And, still according to him, it is not too late and the investigation can still be opened.
"The management of a cathedral is very complicated, there is a sharing of responsibilities between the clergy, the City of Paris and national monuments,
" he said.
The consequence is that the responsibility of the cathedral resulted from procedures and contracts which were not very clear, with rather weak means and totally entangled responsibilities.
"
The investigation, even late, would not aim so much to find possible culprits, but to "
prevent this from happening again
" in the 86 other state cathedrals.
According to the first results of the investigation revealed in the summer of 2019, the fire would probably not be of criminal origin but accidental: short circuit, butt left on the site.
But poor maintenance of the electrical installations and a series of human malfunctions on the night of the disaster would have contributed to making the fire more serious than it should have been.
"Room for progress on transparency"
The Court of Auditors also looked into the management of donations and the establishment of the public establishment responsible for carrying out the work.
As of December 31, 2019, fundraising amounted to € 824 million and mobilized 338,086 donors.
"
There is room for progress on the transparency of the use of these funds
" underline the magistrates.
The cost of this fundraising is around 500,000 euros for certain organizations, including the Fondation Notre-Dame.
This is classic
,
in the eyes of the Court, since foundations always have management fees.
The Heritage Foundation, however, waived these costs.
We are not convinced that the donors intended to finance salaries and rents unrelated to the site.
Pierre Moscovici, President of the Court of Auditors
The Court of Auditors raises, more broadly, the question of the use of donations by the various foundations and particularly by the public establishment responsible for supervising the work and headed by General Georgelin.
With an annual budget of 5 million euros, it employs 39 people and rents premises of 476 square meters in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, for a rent of around 260,000 euros, charges included.
“To put it simply, we are not convinced that the donors had the objective of financing salaries and rents not directly related to the site,
” underlines Pierre Moscovici.
In order "
not to disappoint them"
, the Court calls for funding for the public establishment by the Ministry of Culture, on which it depends.
And promises to do a second assessment, in 2022.