Hundreds of people sleeping on the streets of Paris, carrying their bags and young children, boarded buses surrounded by armed police on Thursday, the latest group of migrants and homeless people to be driven out of the city ahead of the opening ceremony of the 2024 Olympics.
The group of mostly African migrants left for the outskirts of the city on buses paid for by the French government and stayed in temporary housing at least until the end of the Games. While some living on the streets were happy to have a roof over their heads for the night, few knew what lay ahead once the eyes of the world turned away from Paris.
“It’s like poker. I don’t know where I’ll go, or how long I’ll stay,” said Nikki, a 47-year-old homeless Parisian who requested that her last name not be used to protect her privacy.
French authorities have been clearing out migrant and homeless camps for months ahead of the massive global sporting event, a pivotal moment for President Emmanuel Macron at a time of political turmoil. But the Games have also faced criticism, as Parisians have complained about everything from hikes in public transport fees to the government spending on cleaning the Seine River for swimming instead of investing in social safety nets.
Authorities have also been heavily criticised for bussing migrants camped out of the city centre to the outskirts of Paris or other regions. Activist groups and migrants have described the practice – which has long been used in other Olympic host cities such as Rio de Janeiro in 2016 – as a form of “social cleansing”.
“They want to clean up the city for the Olympic Games, for tourists,” said Nathan Lekaux, an organizer with the activist group Utopia 56. “As the treatment of migrants becomes more terrible and infamous, people are being chased off the streets… since the Olympics, this aggression, this policy of predation, has become more explicit.”
Christophe Noël du Perrat, chief of staff of the regional government of Île-de-France, which surrounds Paris, strongly denied the allegations and said the government had been relocating migrants from the city for years.
“We are taking care of them,” he said. “We don’t understand the criticism because we are very determined to give these people a place.”
He spoke as dozens of police surrounded the migrants, preventing them from walking in the streets and putting up caution tape. When asked why there were so many armed police officers for a group largely made up of families, Noel du Perrat said it was to maintain “peace and tranquility.”
The buses on Thursday came after three days of protests by hundreds of migrants and other homeless people like Nikki, who slept in front of a local government office as athletes and tourists flocked to Paris. They railed against authorities breaking up homeless camps and demanded better access to temporary housing.
Among them was Natasha Louise Gbeti, a 36-year-old migrant from Burkina Faso and her 1-year-old son on her back. Gbeti, who once worked as an accountant in her home country, moved with family members to the southern French city of Montpellier five years ago.
Many of the families relocated by French authorities are like Gbeti’s — coming from African countries that were once French colonies, including Burkina Faso, Guinea, Ivory Coast and Senegal.
After an abusive situation, she moved to Paris. She was making ends meet by babysitting and sleeping in public housing. That all ended before the Olympics, when she said access to social housing was reduced and the prices of living in dormitories soared. She said most employers in France don’t want to hire her because she is an immigrant without legal status, and she has felt rejected as an anti-immigrant far-right party has gained more power in France.
“I think the number of migrants in France has increased. They are tired of migrants, they want us to leave their country,” Gabetti said.
The protest group agreed that families would travel on buses to provinces near Paris and that families would stay together in shelters.
Despite the agreement, protest leaders expressed concerns the move would isolate migrants and said it was still unclear what would happen to the city’s homeless people.
Like Gabetti, others are also worried about the future of their one-year-old son Richard. Gabetti said that despite being born in France, he is one of those who have been forgotten.
“Our children are French,” he said. “They will be the future engineers and officials of this country. Think about them first and forget about the Olympics for now.”
At Place de la République, a popular square for protests in central Paris, they were trying to encourage people to do the same on the eve of the grand opening ceremony on the River Seine.
Several associations gathered for the ‘Counter Opening Ceremony’ and gave speeches about the cost of the Games. They said the authorities were using them as an excuse for social cleansing by removing migrants and homeless people from the streets to maintain a picture-postcard image of the city.
“Even these last weeks there was an arch under the metro line where people were sleeping, and they put up a cement wall to prevent people from coming back,” said Paul Allauzie, spokesman for the Reverse de la Médaille group (the other side of the medal). “There’s a quay in Aubervilliers where they put concrete blocks with nails on them.”
A huge banner was hung from the square’s iconic statue, reading ‘J’O de l’exclusion, 12,500 personnes éxpulsées’ (Boycott of the Games, 12,500 expelled).
“Shame, shame, shame,” the crowd of about 200 chanted as smoke canisters in the colours of the Olympic rings were released.
Various banners were put up around the square.
One read “La France, championne du mal-logement” (France, the champion of poor housing). Another read “L’heure est grave. Pas de logements, pas de joie” (The situation is grave. No order, no games). Another called for the Olympic torch to be extinguished and a flag showed French President Emmanuel Macron with his hands through the Olympic rings as if he were handcuffed.
Noah Fargin, a spokesman for SAK 2024 – a group that has long campaigned against the Games – called the Paris Olympics “a monstrous waste of public money”. He said the image presented was a mere sham.
“Paris is being turned into a Disneyland for tourists, which is the image of LVMH (Louis Vuitton),” Fargion said. “But on the other hand, people who actually live in the city are being pushed out. Instead of helping people find a place to live, money is being invested in suppressing them.”
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