Faced with a stalled strike and growing piles of garbage, the mayor of Marseille called on private companies on Tuesday to pick up the rubbish that threatens to reach the sea, an unprecedented measure in the second city of France. .
Near the famous Marseille corniche, several garbage collectors and their two small dump trucks are trying to get to the end of an imposing pile of rubbish that overflows onto the sidewalk. A task made even more difficult by the mistral and its gusts of more than 120 km/h.
Faced with what she describes as a “serious and imminent danger” for the safety of the people of Marseille, and this third garbage collectors’ strike in four months, the town hall has therefore decided to act.
“It is tons of waste that there is still today”, and this waste “which flies away, it is as much pollution which accumulates on our beaches”, comments, near the coast, Yannick Ohanessian , the socialist deputy mayor in charge of security and prevention.
“Yesterday morning, I opened my store, I had a rat sleeping in front, in the middle of the city. We are in the third world”, denounces Célia, a tattoo artist in her thirties facing the accumulation rubbish located barely one meter from his business.
Going beyond its prerogatives, since waste collection normally falls to the Aix-Marseille-Provence metropolis, led by Martine Vassal (LR), the municipality mobilized six dump trucks on Tuesday, belonging to private companies, to collect waste in priority areas, i.e. regarding 5 tons in total.
“The objective is to do everything to get out of this situation which is becoming unbearable for everyone”, insists the elected representative of Marseille, defending himself from wanting to “break” the opposing social conflict, around the reform of the time of work, the majority union FO to the city, to the metropolis and to these leaders.
– Myth of Sisyphus –
“The choice of the mayor is a courageous, difficult choice, but an initiative had to be taken”, pleads Mr. Ohanessian: to this “exceptional situation”, an “exceptional response” was needed.
A helping hand that the metropolis says “willingly take”, considering that what matters is “that the stock of household waste on the public highway”, currently around 2,000 tonnes, “is evacuated as quickly as possible”, has indicated to AFP Yves Moraine, in charge of negotiations with the unions.
“We are in lace every day to bring out as many skips as possible,” assured the elected LR, stressing that since Thursday, around 900 tonnes of garbage have been collected in addition to classic rounds.
“Our priority is first of all to ensure a massive presence on the entire coast, to go where it becomes dangerous, where it blocks streets, where there is a real danger for the ecology and our environment”, explained Yannick Ohanessian.
“If following this episode of mistral follows a rainy episode, it is a guaranteed health disaster, and therefore we must go very quickly”, he specifies, also mentioning the risk of fire in the face of the many fires. bins triggered by exasperated residents.
Since this weekend, “we have regarding fifteen garbage fires a day”, details Rear Admiral Augier, commander of the Marseille firefighters battalion. And the risk, “with this strong wind, is to go towards a tragedy”, he adds, fearing that the flames will spread to adjacent buildings.
Black cap screwed on the ears, wind obliges, Marco packs the waste in the dumpster of the small truck: “the private plus the metropolis, we all get started, so it should be restored in no time”, wants to believe the + ripeur + , which usually works for garbage collection in schools.
Adrien Piquera, spokesperson for the association “1 waste per day”, is less optimistic: “I no longer see the difference between picking up waste and the myth of Sisyphus”.
