An advisor to President Emmanuel Macron has announced that he will be moving out of Paris due to the city becoming an open “trash can” and the violence plaguing the French capital.
Stéphane Bern, a prominent television host in France who has been tasked with raising funds for national heritage by the Macron government, revealed over the weekend that he will be moving into the countryside after living in Paris for most of the past five decades.
In comments made to Le Parisien reported by Le Figaro, Bern said: “Paris has become a trash can… Where has the City of Lights gone?”
“I’ve been living there since I was 10, and I can’t take it anymore,” he said.
Specifying his complaints with the current state of Paris, Bern pointed to the dirtiness of the city, constant construction, noise and “above all, violence”.
The socialist mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo came under fire earlier this year when the hashtag “#saccageparis”, which translates to “trashed Paris”, went viral on social media in response to the growing level of trash on the streets of the allegedly picturesque city. Rather than taking responsibility for her failures to keep her city clean, the leftist politician cast blame on the “far-right” for spreading the hashtag.
Similar to Democrat-run cities in America such as San Francisco and Los Angeles, Paris has also been beset by large-scale homeless camps, populated mostly by migrants. Hidalgo has also come under criticism for planning to open up “shooting rooms” for crack addicts to have a place do hard drugs in the city.
The French capital has also seen violence among different minority ethnic groups, with groups such as Pakistani and North African communities increasingly waging turf wars in the suburbs of Paris.
Commenting on a brawl June, a Paris police major said: “In a fight that perhaps 20 years ago would have been sorted out with fists or kicks, we now see people being run over with cars,” adding: “The population is increasingly violent. It’s no longer simply fighting. They absolutely have to win, even if that means leaving someone in agony on the floor.”
Stéphane Bern attempted to deflect blame away from the socialist mayor — whom he is friends with — for the growing problems, saying that it would “be too easy”, saying that the primary culprit are the inhabitants of Paris.
“She certainly has her share of responsibility, but she does not deserve all the blows that are given to her,” he said.
Bern also said that he believes the mayor is being “blackmailed” by green allies within her coalition, saying: “I hoped that they would become the defenders of our urban heritage and of trees… But there has never been so many trees felled, nor so much concrete.”
Follow Kurt Zindulka on Twitter here @KurtZindulka
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