The man who knows all the secrets of the 2024 Games: "Paris will be the safest place in the world"
He had always lived the sport from the field, but now he has started to manage his logistics from the other side of the barrier. From playing rugby championships with the French team to organizing the biggest sporting event in the country to date: the Paris Olympics. Pierre Rabadan (Aix en Provence, 1980) is Deputy Mayor of Paris, Councilor for Sports and responsible for the Organization of the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games. The man who has the map, and all the secrets, of the Parisian date.
An event for which there is still a year to go, but which is already surrounded by controversy: on Tuesday the police searched several venues linked to the organization in the framework of two investigations on suspicion of favoritism in the awarding of public contracts for Olympic works.
Although the interview takes place before this police operation, Rabadan affirms that “everything is going according to the calendar. Despite the operational difficulties and setbacks that have occurred, such as the Covid pandemic, because many raw materials came from China and the restrictions lasted much longer there, or right now the war in Ukraine. Despite everything, there are no risks ».
62 Olympic works
He receives EL MUNDO in his office at the Hotel de Ville, the headquarters of the City Council, where he has a giant map of Paris in which he indicates how the event will take place in each of its stages. The opening ceremony, he proudly explains, will tour the Seine, with all the delegations navigating the river in an “act like there has been no other like it”. A spectacular ceremony with which Paris wants to impress, but quite a challenge in terms of security.
The Olympic village in Seine Saint-Denis, celebration centers scattered throughout the city, the Parc des Princes, Roland Garros…. In total, there are 62 Olympic works in different parts of the capital and surroundings, where new facilities are being built but, above all, adapting existing spaces. A total of 46 of these works are still unfinished.
One of the largest complexes is the athletes' village, in Saint-Denis, a work involving 400 companies. Located on the outskirts, it will have some 40 hectares and will host some 10,000 Olympic athletes and 4,500 Paralympians. The works “are almost at 92% and at the beginning of 2024 it will be finished”.
“Feeling of insecurity”
Rabadan admits some of the concerns that are raised, such as the increase in cost (it already amounts to 4,400 million), but above all those related to security and the organizational capacity of the capital, where transport often collapses and strikes multiply.. The French Court of Auditors itself has shown its concern in this regard.
Paris is the most touristic city in the world, with 12 million visitors. Next summer 15 million are expected, three more than in a normal summer period. Rabadan believes that there will be a sufficient supply of accommodation, despite the controversy that already exists because the rentals of tourist apartments and hotels are skyrocketing.
The headquarters of Paris 2024, in the Saint-Denis district.
Regarding security, the former athlete acknowledges that it is normal “for there to be a feeling of insecurity”, which, he admits, “comes above all after the Champions League final”, between Liverpool and Real Madrid. last year.
The event was chaotic because there were access problems, the police had to intervene and dozens of fans jumped over the security perimeter fences to enter the Stade de France. To this are added the robberies suffered by numerous fans in Saint Denis, one of the most abandoned areas of the Parisian periphery and where the Olympic village will be.
The Champions League final was a catastrophe in terms of organization
“The Champions League was a catastrophe in terms of organization, there was a lack of security,” acknowledges Rabadan, who justifies the deficient arrangement in the fact that, when the war in Ukraine broke out, “what should have been organized in 10 months was made in two”. “It was an accumulation of failures, of bad circumstances. The image was bad and it is normal for there to be concern, ”acknowledges the one who was a rugby champion with the national team.
The Stade de France “is a safe place for the Cup (the Rugby Cup that will take place in autumn) and for the Games”, and in the rest of the Olympic spaces, such as the Parc des Princes, “they are used to managing large flows of people”.
The Seine as a common thread
The great security challenge “is the inauguration ceremony, since there are 12 kilometers to cover”, following the course of the river. It is the headache of the Ministry of the Interior, which has devised a ticket system that will allow access to be controlled, since they will be nominal. The mobilization of 30,000 agents is expected and the use of video surveillance cameras with algorithms and drones has been validated, which will allow any movement to be monitored.
“An event is a success if it is well organized,” says Rabadan, who assures that Paris, at the Games, “will be the safest place in the world”. «The city will offer a unique and exceptional setting. It is difficult to find a better environment for the Games than the Seine, the common thread of the Paris bid, there is nothing that can better show the heritage of the city than this symbol, the river».
As an athlete, he believes that the athletes will not have experienced a similar event before: «We want the experience of the athletes to be unique, when for example they do the aquatic tests and swim in the Seine. Athletes will have no equivalent in what they have lived before ».