About a 100 years after its first tryst with holding the Olympic Games, Paris is geared up to play host again to the world’s massive multi-sporting event.
Only a week is left for the opening ceremony to kick off on 26 July – the Games will continue till 11 August.
The Olympics are said to be a great platform to project a nation’s soft power. But this time around, host city Paris has been in the news for all the wrong reasons.
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Complaints have been flooding the internet and poor media stories are putting a dent on efforts by authorities to make Paris a picture-perfect city for this year’s Games.
Nearly 44% Parisians, according to a poll by the Odoxa Institute, say that hosting the Olympics has been a “bad thing”, and 52% said they would leave the city ahead of the Games. But why are Parisians feeling this way?
Students forced out of dorms
Around 2,200 students have been forced out of their housing to make way for Olympics workers such as civil security officials, law enforcement, and firefighters among others.
The move was sharply criticised by student unions and left-wing politicians, and an appeal filed in the court by CROUS, the student housing management body. But earlier this year, France’s highest administrative court, the Conseil d’Etat, ruled in favour of Paris authorities and order to move thousands of students out of their apartments to reserve them for workers of the upcoming Games.
It said that students who are affected would be provided with alternate accommodation, a compensation of 100 Euros, and two tickets for the Games.
However, local reports say that by mid-April, only about 100 students have been rehoused.
According to a report published by Le Monde, “In total, in the three academies of Paris, Versailles and Créteil, more than 1,400 students have requested a new room for the summer.”
“Students are moving out of their accommodation without knowing whether they will be back when the new academic year starts…” it said.
In addition, thousands of homeless immigrants have also been asked to vacate the streets of Paris and board buses to cities like Lyon or Marseille.
There are about 7 million immigrants living in France, about 10.3% of the population, with numbers rising steadily since 2000, according to a recent report published by Reuters.
Mayor takes dip in Seine to prove clean water
A dirty Seine has been another big controversy surrounding the Olympics, as much of the opening ceremony this time, will be out of the stadium and into the Seine.
It is a break from the Olympic tradition – a lavish open-air ceremony will include an athletes’ parade on the river. But swimming in the Seine has been banned for over a century despite perennial promises to clean up the river.
French authorities have spent 1.4 billion euros in the last decade to clean up the river and improve Paris’ sewage systems, whose overflow automatically diverges untreated sewage directly into the river.
This has been one of the most challenging and costly promises of the Paris Olympics.
But to prove that the river’s waters are now clean, Paris’ mayor Anne Hidalgo took a dip in the Seine on 17 July, 9 days before the opening ceremony. She wore a full-body suit.
Till about June, when her original dop was planned, the hashtag “jechiedanslaSeine” (“I’m pooping in the Seine”) was trending on social media as some threatened to protest the Olympics by defecating upstream.
The Seine will host several open-water swimming events during the games, including marathon swimming and the swimming legs of the Olympic and Paralympic triathlons.
Grumpy Parisians
Nearly 9 million tickets have been sold, promising a huge spike in visitors to the host city.
Prices are seeing a titanic rise across ticketing, transportation, hotels, and any affiliated services.
“Crazy… just crazy,” 23-year-old Flavien Lallemand told CNN about the price of the available tickets. “It’s a shame, it’s being done in our city, it’s just next door…,” he said, adding that he’ll likely end up watching the games on TV at home.
“The price makes me sick,” according to former Olympic gymnast Marine Debauve, who was quoted in CNN as saying that tickets to the gymnastics final event would cost her $742 – more than the cost of participating in the event.
“It may be easier to participate in the Olympics than see it as a spectator in my own country,” she said on Facebook, echoing the anger of many others.
According to data published by Statista, there is a huge gulf in ticket prices for the Olympics, with the most expensive tickets for the finals in Athletics, Swimming and Basketball priced at €980, which is more than 40 times the price of the cheapest tickets available for each sport.
The truth is turning out to be bitter: even if the Oympics go off without a hitch, Parisians most likely won’t be there to see it.
Also, as the metro lines are expected to become the main transportation mode during the Games, it is expected that the number of daily passengers would increase from the usual 150,000 to over 800,000. Bus and metro fares are expected to double or triple for six weeks, the duration of the Olympic and Paralympic games.
Parisians are also grumpy about property rates going sky high – by as much as 85%. And none the least, there has been a hijab-ban controversy to top it all – France will not allow its athletes to wear head coverings.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has however, made it clear that athletes can represent themselves and their faith, as well as their country. “For the Olympic Village, the IOC rules apply,” an IOC spokesperson told Reuters. “There are no restrictions on wearing the hijab or any other religious or cultural attire in the Olympic Village.” France however, has invoked its strict rules on secularism to ban the host county athletes from wearing religious symbols during the Olympics.
With so many controversies and complaints surrounding the Olympics this year, it remains to be seen how Paris will pull off the Games successfully. Parisians are well known to be critical but also proud of their legacy. Despite the challenges, everything may appear fine and beautiful even if on the surface – and the organisers are definitely determined to make Paris look its best when the Games begin.
