2024-09-24 03:36:45
The Minister of the Interior, Bruno Retailleau, at the Elysée Palace, September 23, 2024. JULIEN MUGUET FOR “LE MONDE”
It did not take long to dissipate, if there was any, any ambiguity about Bruno Retailleau’s priorities. Monday, September 23, when he took office in Beauvau, the new Minister of the Interior presented them in a formula that is more of an incantation than a program: “Restore order, restore order, restore order.” »
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By materializing the hard line that he has chosen to embody, he is certainly achieving a first “publicity stunt” by ensuring immediate coverage on continuous news channels and on social networks. But, to be striking, this slogan turns out to be a little short. And it will take more than a sort of security abracadabra to improve a situation which fully deserves Place Beauvau its nickname of “ministry of emergencies”.
Degraded context overseas, where two Kanaks were shot dead in New Caledonia by the GIGN, on the night of September 18 to 19, and where clashes between police and demonstrators in Martinique against the backdrop of yet another denunciation of the high cost of living took place; rarely equaled level of homicides and attempted homicides on the drug trafficking front; terrorist threat still significant… At the same time as his ministerial portfolio, Bruno Retailleau inherits a tense, if not poisonous, climate. Even the appointments of the new directors general of the police and the gendarmerie cannot suffer from the slightest delay: on September 29, the current holders of the positions, Frédéric Veaux for the police, Christian Rodriguez for the gendarmerie, will officially leave their functions.
“We should never criticize our police officers”
It is useless, in these circumstances, to consider the slightest aggiornamento of certain police practices or any reflection on the thorny question of police-population relations. On this chapter, moreover, Mr. Retailleau’s opinion has been formed for a long time: “We should never criticize our police officers”he declared, in April 2017, while he served as coordinator of François Fillon’s presidential campaign. Monday, on the occasion of his first formal outing, the minister did it again in the Cour des Invalides, where he presided over the farewell ceremony of the “boss” of the gendarmerie, General Christian Rodriguez: “For the police, I will never give in, I will not give up and will not tolerate any attack, any offense. »
With the attachment of a delegated ministry responsible for everyday security, attributed to Nicolas Daragon, the Minister of the Interior sent a first signal on his method, perhaps inspired by a proven process, from Charles Pasqua to Christophe Castaner. The first with Robert Pandraud, the second with Laurent Nuñez, current Paris police prefect, had already enlisted the services of security technicians. But, this time, rather than a senior civil servant, Mr. Retailleau preferred the profile of a local elected official, with the mayor of Valence, a city affected by drug trafficking, and vice-president of the Association of Mayors of France .
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