In the 1990s, Redouane Attillah was a "Messenger" at Chanteloup. This town in Yvelines, where Matthieu Kassovitz had set up his cameras to shoot La Haine, had a bad reputation. Thirty years later, this "big brother" confides in us the hope that he has of getting young people out of the spiral of idleness.

INTERVIEW

In the 1990s, you were a sort of mediator at Chanteloup. What was your role?
The name we gave to our association at the start was Les Messagers. We sent a message to the youngest, the little brothers. We told them not to do bullshit: don't do burglary, don't smoke, don't hang out with the wrong people, go to school in the morning, listen to parents, respect the elderly, don't do anything stupid, do not break the windows of the trains or pull the alarm systems, etc. The goal was to keep our city clean.

And then it grew, it became "The big brothers", then the Juppé jobs ... Many of us then worked as mediators for the RATP or the SNCF.

In 1994, Matthieu Kassovitz shot La Haine in Chanteloup. What did the film bring you?
It was a pride, it was great! We only saw that on TV. We watched the movies, when they shot a bullet we thought it was real! When Mathieu Kassovitz and his actors came to shoot the film, we saw the special effects, the stunts… We understood how it goes for a film. The film La Haine made a lot of people happy in Chanteloup. There was even one of us who continued to follow them, to learn, and today he is an actor.

In those years, Chanteloup had a sulphurous reputation. What has changed since then?
Chanteloup was not a hyper-violent city, not at all. We heard a lot about it but it was a small town. Today, we are more than 15,000 inhabitants. In the 1980s, there were 5,000. Chanteloup has not changed. It's just that there are more young people, but no one can understand them. No one goes to them to take them by the hand and ask them what they want to do.

There are young people who want to work, to get by. They are told to go to Pole Emploi. They go there once, twice, three times, but they find nothing. They go to the bosses, who never call them back. So these young people stay in town. But that's not why they are bad people.

Heard on europe1:

Many young people do not know what they want to do in life. But if we show them the way, maybe they will like it, they will integrate, get to the bottom and succeed

Young people must be taken by the hand, but here, at 14 or 15 years of age, they are thrown out of school. They have to find another one, but where? In Mantes-la-Jolie, Les Mureaux, Achères? Can you imagine a young person who will get up at 6 a.m. to go to school at the age of 15? It's not possible…

They are in the square, 5 or 6 and they have nothing to do. If there is one who has a bad idea, the others will follow him ... But if we had 2, 3 or 4 people, like the Messengers in the past, they would go to them to take them by the hand. Many young people do not know what they want to do in life. But if we show them the way, maybe they will like it, they will integrate, get to the bottom and succeed. We have boxers, footballers, masons ... We have lots of young people who want to rebuild the marquee that burned down. Why ? To find an activity. But these young people are not given the opportunity…

Do you seem defeatist?
There is always hope. We just need people who invest themselves, who believe in these young people and who reach out to them. You shouldn't talk about them from afar, point your finger at them. If there are people who go to them, understand them, sit with them around a table, then at least 8 out of 10 will get by and follow the word of those who are willing to help them. You just have to tell them: "Go ahead, you can find a job, pass your license, have a diploma ... You can do it but it is not by staying in your neighborhood that you will become someone!"