Socialist Benoît Payan was elected mayor of Marseille on Monday, December 21, and promised to continue the fight against inequalities started by Michèle Rubirola, who resigned after less than six months at the head of France's second city.
"I am a member of a majority which defends a greener, fairer and more democratic city which gives itself two priorities: to bring together the Marseillais by fighting injustices and to draw the horizon of a sustainable city", launched the elected official. 42 years old, shortly after receiving the tricolor scarf from the one who belongs to the same union of the left of the Marseille Spring, Michèle Rubirola.
#CMMarseille @BenoitPayan, elected 47th Mayor of the City, delivers his first speech to the Marseillaises and the Marseillais.
Find all of his speech.
➡️ https://t.co/grRrtGA6T2 pic.twitter.com/QEIgqOwrSp
- City of Marseille (@marseille) December 21, 2020
The first woman elected mayor of Marseille, this environmental doctor resigned on December 15, after less than six months in office, citing health reasons and the scale of the crisis experienced by one of the poorest cities in France.
She had wanted her first deputy to succeed her and become the "emergency physician" needed by the Mediterranean city, which swung to the left in the last municipal elections, after 25 years of reign of the right and of Jean-Claude Gaudin.
Benoît Payan obtained 53 votes in the vote, that is to say all the votes of the Marseilles Spring and the group of Samia Ghali, the former PS senator figure of the popular districts (9 seats), thus ensuring him the absolute majority.
>> To read: Michèle Rubirola, the mayor of Marseille, announces her resignation
The right-wing opposition as a whole refused to take part in the vote.
"This is not an election, it is a designation of mayor which is not legitimate", lambasted Catherine Pila, leader of the LR group (37 seats) at a press conference.
"Your voting members will be able to understand that after having voted for a woman environmentalist, they could end up with a male and socialist mayor. I see it as a form of denial of democracy", had lambasted before the vote Guy Teissier, elected The Republicans and chairman of the meeting.
In the tradition of Gaston Defferre
The nine elected members of the National Rally also left the hemicycle during the vote to signify their dissatisfaction with the reversal of roles between the first deputy and Michèle Rubirola.
With Benoît Payan, one of the youngest mayors of Marseille, the Socialist Party symbolically takes over the chair occupied for 33 years by Gaston Defferre, former Minister of the Interior of François Mitterrand and emblematic figure of Marseille political life.
A notary by training, Benoît Payan has never practiced, and is a socialist apparatchik.
He made his debut in the Bouches-du-Rhône department, then headed by Jean-Noël Guérini, then in the cabinets, in the region, then with Minister Marie-Arlette Carlotti in the government of François Hollande.
"I know the financial situation of our city. Its social and economic consequences. We will overcome it," he promised.
>> False proxies, touts, intimidation: in Marseille, an election that turns into crime fiction
Michèle Rubirola had insisted on the triple crisis facing Marseille, saying she was unable because of "health tests" to put all his energy into it.
"Being mayor of Marseille is 300% of his time, I give 150%", she pleaded, also highlighting the "violent health crisis" of Covid-19 and "the calamitous financial situation" of the municipality, after a quarter of a century of management by the right.
Benoît Payan wants to continue to promote the priorities displayed by the Marseille Spring: fight against unsanitary housing, in a city marked by the collapse of two dilapidated buildings which killed eight in 2018, renovation of schools, reduction in inequalities.
With AFP
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