The Carrousel, at night, at Machines de l'île in Nantes -

JD Billaud / LVAN

  • The director of La Folle Journée had to resign for illicit financial movements, while the Voyage à Nantes was raided as part of an investigation into the funding of the Heron Tree.

  • The Nantes right points the finger at the responsibility of Johanna Rolland and denounces an opaque "system".

  • The majority defends itself and is indignant at these "political accusations".

They say they are "very concerned about the revelations of the weekend."

First on Thursday, searches were carried out in the premises of the Voyage à Nantes as part of a judicial inquiry concerning the financing of the construction of the Carrousel des mondes marinas in 2012. Then the next day, the director of La Folle Journée was forced to resign due to the discovery of illicit financial movements between the public company organizing the festival and the feminist association Espace Simone-de-Beauvoir which it chairs.

For the elected members of the municipal opposition group Mieux vivre à Nante, it is "not only the directors of two essential structures of Nantes' cultural life who are being questioned", it is "the whole Rolland system that needs to be questioned. ".

The Nantes right point the finger at the responsibility of the president of Nantes metropolis on the two files.

“It was Johanna Rolland who appointed Joëlle Kérivin [the resigned director] in 2015 at the head of SAEM Folle Journée, a structure put together from scratch by the town hall in which she placed friends” attack Laurence Garnier (LR) , senator and leader of the group.

“The metropolis does not say what sums were embezzled.

The people of Nantes have the right to see clearly.

It is our role to ask for clarification, ”she adds.

"The Rolland system is organized opacity"

The elected representatives of the opposition, who consider that the management of the Voyage à Nantes "lack of transparency", "also wonder a lot" about that of the Institute of Advanced Studies (IEA), a research foundation subsidized by the city ​​of Nantes.

“Its operation is opaque.

Audits were requested but refused.

It's worrying to say the least, ”warns Julien Bainvel (LR), municipal councilor.

He announces that he will seize the Regional Chamber of Accounts on this file and “send it tangible elements”.

The opposition also calls for an “independent financial audit” of the city's main public companies (IEA, Samoa, VAN, École des Beaux-arts, Nantes Métropole Aménagement, etc.).

“The practices of the Rolland system are organized opacity and the multiplication of structures in order to remain in power, attacked Foulques Chombart de Lauwe (LR), another municipal councilor.

There are individual faults but there is also a comfortable interpersonal skills of those who have been at the helm for 30 years.

"

Finally, the Nantes right is demanding to suspend the Heron Tree project because of the investigation targeting the Voyage à Nantes and the designers of the Machines de l'île.

“Johanna Rolland was extremely quick to stop the new stadium project as soon as a financial investigation targeted Waldemar Kita.

The same precautionary measure is requested for the Heron Tree.

It's a question of consistency, ”explains Laurence Garnier.

“Nauseabious, unworthy and pathetic!

"

The first deputy mayor of Nantes, Bassem Asseh (PS), reacted strongly this Friday evening to the accusations of the municipal opposition.

"It's nauseating, outrageous and pathetic!"

The opposition tries to cast suspicion on all employees of mixed economy companies (SEM) who perform public service missions.

Under the guise of transparency, peddles fabricated lies for a strictly political purpose.

It wants to tarnish the image of the IEA, an internationally recognized high-level research establishment.

He recalls that it is the city of Nantes which made public the financial movements within the Folle Journée.

The community also filed a complaint against the director.

"We have strengthened the measures initiated in the previous mandate with the creation of an Ethics and Transparency Commission whose chairmanship has been proposed to the opposition, the recruitment of an ethics officer, the adoption of a code of ethics", Bassem Asseh also specifies.

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Nantes: Ecology, security, citizen dialogue, communication… The five challenges that Johanna Rolland will have to take up

Nantes

Folle Journée de Nantes: The director resigns after "very significant cash flows"

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