Armed municipal police, or not? A clean city, but how? What place for the car? Seven candidates for the mayor of Paris ginned their measures and tried to convince the voters, during a first debate Wednesday March 5 on LCI.
The first to throw himself into the bath is Cédric Villani, according to a draw. In five minutes, the medalist mathematician Fields, promises that "we will no longer hear Parisians talk endlessly about their everyday problems, because they are suffering".
"They suffer from traffic jam problems and suffer from pollution, from the streets which are not clean and which are insecure", insists the deputy excluded from LREM for having refused to approach the official candidate, at the time Benjamin Griveaux.
A nudge exchanged with the mathematician to greet him, and here is the outgoing PS mayor, Anne Hidalgo, on the set to describe her dream of a city like the banks of the Seine, whose pedestrianization has been enamelled with many judicial twists and turns, "a city where we breathe, where we can let go of the hand of our children, we can walk, a city where we reduce the place of the car, reduce pollution".
Rachida Dati denounces "anarchy everywhere"
"I run in apnea on the banks which are open pit latrines", replied him later, the candidate LR Rachida Dati, who denounced an "anarchy everywhere (...) in traffic, in works, in public space ".
Entering the municipal battle two weeks ago, Agnès Buzyn (LREM), more discreet, assured that "it has been a long time since (she) has been thinking about this mandate". "I told myself that the most beautiful mandate is that of mayor," assured the candidate, who suffers from a deficit of notoriety.
While ecology is at the center of the debate, David Belliard, the candidate of Europe Ecology-The Greens (EELV), losing momentum in the polls, has brought to the fore his plan to unearth the Bièvre, river Parisian buried, and thus create freshness to better fight against the effects of the heat wave.
# Municipales2020
🗣 @David_Belliard on the Bièvre, this underground river that the candidate wants to resurface in the capital:
"My project for Paris is to restore freshness and places to live for Parisians"
📺 #LaGrandeConfrontationParis # La26 pic.twitter.com/TjeJXV1Fxm
Approaching the first round of municipal elections on March 15, the battle remains very indecisive and the stakes are high for the three candidates who lead the race in the polls. According to a Harris Interactive-Epoka survey released on Tuesday, Rachida Dati continues to progress (25%), ahead of Anne Hidalgo (24%) and LREM Agnès Buzyn (17%). Then come the environmentalist David Belliard (11%) and the dismissed deputy of LREM Cédric Villani (8%) - both barely having flirted with the 15% -. Finally, at the bottom of the table, the rebellious Danielle Simonnet (5%) and the candidate supported by the National Rally Serge Federbusch (4%). The eighth candidate, Marcel Campion, credited around 1%, was not invited to the debate.
>> See also: Municipal: three women in the battle for Paris
Anne Hidalgo in front of its balance sheet
Faced with criticism of her record, Anne Hidalgo struggled to answer for her record and justify her decisions, such as her changes in position relating to the municipal police that the outgoing mayor long refused before claiming, to manage the problems of incivilities.
Another concern in the capital, housing, in a city where the purchase price has "exceeded 11,000 euros per square meter this week", according to Agnès Buzyn, who denounced "crazy prices".
Regarding the policy of the outgoing mayor in combating the rental platform AirBnb, the former Minister of Health deemed his proposal to reduce the number of overnight stays (today fixed at 120 days per year) "indecent". "You have 29 people to control AirBnb, and 300 people for communication," she said.
Denouncing "exorbitant prices", David Belliard, the youngest among the candidates, wishes to "use (er) the existing", or put "vacant homes and second homes" on the market, recalling his opposition to new construction.
We must "requisition empty housing" and ensure that jobs are developed on the outskirts of the capital, to limit the movement of employees in Ile-de-France, said Insoumise, Danielle Simonnet.
While the mayor of Paris wants to continue his policy of social housing and reach 25% by 2025, or continue the land project to allow access to property for middle class households, Serge Federbusch, scathing, has denounced a "demagoguery festival".
This first debate will be followed on March 10 by a second organized by France Télévisions, and another between the two rounds, on BFMTV, on March 18.
With AFP
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