Offensive tags, insults, physical attacks… These incivilities have become the daily life of some town hall officials, and even elected officials.
On Wednesday in Nantes, 38 mayors and deputies thus volunteered for training provided by the intervention group of the national gendarmerie (GIGN).
"
Excellent training
", welcomes a mayor present, emphasizing the quality of the "
negotiators
" of the intervention brigade who, faced with similar situations, shared their expertise with elected officials.
Practical exercises, simulations and conditioning gave some keys to elected officials to unravel thorny situations, which have become as frequent as they are folkloric within town halls.
"
Between the quarrels of neighbors, dangerous animals or people anxious in the face of Covid, we are called upon for anything and everything,
" explains
Marie-Cécile Gessant
to
Figaro
, mayor of Sautron in the Nantes region.
"
People
quickly get impatient and situations get out of hand very quickly
".
"Respect for the mayor no longer exists"
Organized on an experimental basis in Loire-Atlantique, this training responds to a context of significant increase in tensions in town halls.
In 2019, a consultation launched by the Senate revealed the extent of the phenomenon, while of the 3,800 mayors questioned, 92% declared that they had been victims of incivility, insults, threats or attacks.
"
The mayor is within reach of slaps
", summarizes in
Figaro
Maurice Perrion, president of the Association of Mayors of France (AMF) in Loire-Atlantique, at the initiative of the training organized in partnership with the national gendarmerie.
"
Each attack committed against a local elected official is against the Republic
", underlines the president, recalling that this week again, insulting tags targeting the mayor in particular were reported on the walls of Bouguenais, peripheral town of Nantes.
Read also: "Crime is exploding in the police station": a mayor warns of the insecurity of the countryside
At the town hall of Sautron, these incidents now occur almost every day.
"
It is a small segment of the population, but which poses enormous problems for us
", affirms the mayor.
"
It's our job and we have chosen it, but it is taking on worrying proportions
", confides the elected official who, at the head of her municipality since 2008, has observed a significant increase in incivility over the past six years.
“
There was a respect for the mayor which is completely disappearing today,
” she laments.
Faced with the increase in reports, the AMF set up in 2020 an observatory of incivility, the first results of which are already eloquent: 233 attacks reported between January and July 2020, against only 198 during the same period the previous year.
For its part, the gendarmerie wishes to extend this training, which has been tested in two departments, to volunteer mayors from all regions.
