The situation of waste collection in Paris was confused on Friday March 17, the twelfth day of the garbage collectors' strike against the pension reform, with 10,000 tons of waste not collected but a government that says the requisition of agents "works" . The symbolic bar was crossed Friday at noon, according to the estimate of the town hall which subtracts the waste which could be collected compared to the average in normal times.
After the refusal on Wednesday of PS mayor Anne Hidalgo, supporter of the social movement, to request the requisition of agents from the prefect of police, the latter "required" Thursday evening "the city's cleanliness service" to evacuate the garbage , assured Gérald Darmanin Friday morning. "This requisition is working and makes it possible to collect these trash cans," said the Minister of the Interior on RTL. At the end of the day, the prefecture assured Agence France-Presse that "several operations to start up the garages [of garbage trucks, editor's note] have been organized and agents required". "Dump trucks have come out and the collection service has been strengthened," adds the prefecture.
However, at the beginning of the afternoon, Anne Hidalgo's entourage had told AFP: "no dumpster came out on the public side". The capital has a special collection system established by its first mayor Jacques Chirac: city hall officials collect waste in half of the arrondissements while the other half is served by private service providers. "We have not had dumpsters in the boroughs in public," confirms Delphine Bürkli, the Horizons mayor of the 9th arrondissement, managed by the public and therefore very affected by the absence of collection. But "requisitions of garages for private providers" have taken place, affirms the elected opposition member, who calls for "the solidarity of the City" to equalize the treatment between boroughs.
Precisely, things are going a little better in the 15th arrondissement whose private service provider saw, after a legal action, his garage unlocked Thursday by the police. With this release, the 15th now has 14 skips in action "who are working overtime", the equivalent of the usual 17 skips, says Mayor LR Philippe Goujon. "The problem" now "is that the dumpsters are forced to go to Romainville", northeast of the capital, the opposite of the 15th century. In this waste transfer center, they then have to wait "one to two hours to unload" because of the general congestion, explains the right-wing elected official.
The borough mayor calls for the unblocking of the incinerators of the metropolitan union (Syctom), chaired by the socialist Corentin Duprey who does not want at this stage to request the intervention of the police. "There are only 5 or 6% of garbage collectors on strike," says Delphine Bürkli, who asks to "call on the army to clear the streets". The town hall recognizes that the rate of strikers among its cleaning agents is "below 10%". "This 5% has the power to block all or almost all the collection, by carrying out two types of action: blocking garages under municipal management and incineration centers", summarizes the mayor Horizons of the 5th arrondissement Florence Berthout.
In Ivry-sur-Seine, the largest of Syctom's three incineration sites, the police came on Friday to dislodge the strikers from one of the two adjoining garages, before withdrawing. Access to the factory as to the two garbage truck garages is therefore still blocked, AFP noted. According to the CGT, 95% of the employees of the Ivry treatment site and all the drivers of the two garages were on strike on Friday.
The garbage collectors interviewed are determined to continue their renewable strike in rotation until Monday, the day of the general assembly which must decide on the continuation of the movement.
The appeal of 49.3, decided on Thursday by the government, "has remobilized the troops, in fact (...). We had never had this 100% of strikers on these two garages "in Ivry, "we have it", said on the spot Régis Vieceli, CGT general secretary of the waste and sanitation sector in Paris. “We have twelve years less life expectancy for garbage collectors and seven years less for sewer workers,” argued Fréderic Aubisse, a 54-year-old sewer worker. With two more years of work, "we're going to die at work as they say, it's not possible," he said.
