Exactly one year after the inauguration of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, the French authorities show full confidence that the facilities will be ready and offer the maximum guarantees regarding the security device, the aspect that causes the most concern due to the inherent risks of such a prolonged mass event with such global repercussions.
"France is ready and will be ready without a doubt," said the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron, from New Caledonia, the French archipelago in the South Pacific. The Games will be an important and delicate moment in his second term. If they prove successful, they will help embellish his legacy as head of state. Otherwise, they will add another blemish to a rather bumpy trajectory.
"Enthusiasm has not yet overflowed the Seine, cooled by the price of tickets, security issues and the ecological cost," said the sports newspaper L'Équipe yesterday, which published a special edition with Asterix cartoons alluding to the Games. “The country must rediscover some harmony and brotherhood, erase the stigmata of the burning suburbs, make us forget the demonstrations that degenerated during the pension reforms,” wrote the editorialist on the cover of Le Figaro.
There is little doubt that the facilities will be finished. The keys to the apartments in the Olympic village, for 14,000 athletes and their trainers, will be delivered on March 1. The works are very advanced. The only problem is that they will not have air conditioning. It was not considered essential. As for sports venues, there is no anxiety about setting them up either. Yes, there is more pressure to complete the transport infrastructures, especially the metro.
The real headache is security, although the Paris police prefect, Laurent Nuñez, gives maximum guarantees. The fiasco of the Champions League final in May 2022 was a lesson that has been learned. But the Olympic Games present obvious terrorism risks in a complicated geopolitical environment. The recent outbreak of violence and looting for four nights in a row, following the death of a teenager shot by police, painted a deplorable picture of public order in France. The security forces, overwhelmed for years and disgruntled, will once again be asked a lot.
The opening ceremony, with an unprecedented river parade of the delegations along the Seine, over six kilometers and aboard more than a hundred boats, is a police nightmare. An influx of 500,000 people is expected to be searched. It is estimated that 35,000 agents will have to be deployed. During the Games, more than 20,000 private guards will be required as a complement, a volume that poses problems. There will also be a large anti-drone defense device, the new risk derived from such cheap and accessible technology. France wants to anticipate all scenarios, although it is aware of the impossibility of completely averting the dangers.
