INTERVIEW
What happened in Lozère this weekend? Quiet department in the northeast of Occitanie, relatively untouched by the coronavirus epidemic so far, Lozère saw more than 10,000 people disembark late Saturday evening for a giant rave party in the town of Hures- the parade. The revelers settled on private agricultural land. On their way, they ravaged the pasture and cut the barbed wire supposed to protect the fields. From Sunday 8 a.m., gendarmes began to block access to prevent other kidnappers from joining the party, and two squadrons of mobile gendarmerie deployed by the state came as reinforcements.
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"As mayor, I am powerless and the services of the State, it is better war"
Except that was not enough to dislodge the revelers. Guest of the morning of Europe 1 Monday morning, the prefect of Lozère Valérie Hatsch took stock of the situation. "Five thousand people stayed that night and there were no incidents. All the State services are mobilized to both supervise, verbalize and support this demonstration which was experienced as very brutal by the Lozériens" , she explained.
But why the state did not purely and simply dislodge the revelers, as of Sunday morning? "Because we were surprised by this massive arrival and we were not able to cope with such an important arrival in very few hours", answers the prefect. At the microphone of Europe 1 a few moments earlier, the mayor of Hures-la-Parade, André Baret testified to his weakness of action. "We are not against the fact that people have fun, but here as mayor, I am powerless and the State services are not better off. Unfortunately, it is as usual" , he regretted.
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"I took a decree on Sunday to impose the wearing of a mask"
With the fear of a second wave of the coronavirus epidemic, this gathering (prohibited like all those of more than 5,000 people), also poses many questions from a health point of view. "I took a decree on Sunday to impose the wearing of the mask and I had 15,000 masks delivered immediately when [the ravers] arrived as well as hydroalcoholic gel", explained Valérie Hatsch.
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"Extremely significant" fire risks
"We have several means at our disposal, including a very extensive gendarmerie device. We will verbalize everything that can be, because the farmers have had a very bad experience of this arrival," warns the prefect of Lozère. These are at least three powerless herders who saw their land degraded, while the country is experiencing a significant heat wave that could have serious consequences on the state of the fields ... but also on the security of the region. "We are in a field where there is an extremely high risk of fire," recalls Valérie Hatsch.