“France is proud to host the Olympics, except the EELV mayors,” wrote the Young People with Macron from the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region on Twitter. In question ? “Neither Lyon nor Grenoble wanted to pay the sum requested by the Organizing Committee for the passage of the flame. A new structuring event for our country in which we will not participate, ”they add.
This would mean that the Olympic flame will cross all the other towns in France. Or at least, except those led by Europe Ecologie-Les Verts. Are they really the only elected officials to refuse the passage of the flame in their cities? For what reasons ? 20 minutes make the point.
FAKE OFF
To begin with, neither Grégory Doucet, mayor of Lyon, nor Eric Piole, mayor of Grenoble, had to prevent the Olympic flame from coming to their city. In reality, it is to the departmental councils that the Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games asked to pay the sum of 180,000 euros so that the famous flame crosses their department. So in the Rhône and the Isère, both chaired, not by ecologists, but not Les Républicains.
It is the departments that refused to pay the sum requested. In Isère, Martine Kohly, vice-president in charge of sport and youth, justifies to France Bleu : “It would have passed through only 10 municipalities out of the 39 labeled “land of games”. “And to add:” The cost seemed exorbitant to us for a day of passage in Isère. For this sum we can help the municipalities and the projects they could develop with a longer-term effect”.
On the Rhône side, the president of the LR departmental council Christophe Guilloteau explains: “We are not a big community with a big budget. What was claimed represents all of the grants allocated in one year to all of our sports committees. He also pointed to a lack of fairness: “We don’t have the same means as the Alpes-Maritimes, yet the organization demanded the same amount. Many departments also complained that the cost was too high.
The mayors had the possibility of circumventing the decision
However, the mayors of these departments who refused to pay could have circumvented the decision. For this, they would have had to pay the sum of 180,000 euros themselves. We suspect that if raising such a sum is complicated for a department, it is all the more so for a city, however important it may be.
Because if the Departmental Council of Gironde refused to pay, the flame will still pass through several of its cities: Saint-Emilion, Libourne, Bordeaux and Bordeaux Métropole. Pierre Hurmic, mayor of the Gironde city, moreover EELV, has joined forces with the elected officials of these three other cities, in order to welcome the flame all the same. For the event, Saint-Emilion pays 20,000 euros, Libourne, 30,000 euros, Bordeaux, 30,000 euros and Bordeaux Métropole, 100,000 euros.
The Olympic flame will start in Marseille on May 8, 2024. Carried by 10,000 torchbearers, it will cross France for 80 days, before arriving in Paris on July 26. It will cross 64 territories, including five overseas, for a total of 400 cities. The flame will pass through the Pyrénées-Atlantiques, Corsica, Nord-Pas-de-Calais, and even Brittany, where it will board a trimaran skippered by Armel Le Cléac’h to reach the West Indies.