The presidential campaign, so important under the Fifth Republic, will, it is hoped—beyond the little quips on social media—be a time for debate, for real questions calling for real answers.
In this context, François Hollande, if he is a candidate, will not be spared as the incumbent, and that is perfectly normal. As for me, I have begun to engage in this healthy exercise.
Nicolas Sarkozy will be in the same situation. He will not be able to avoid answering the questions that will inevitably be asked about his exercise of power and his policies from 2007 to 2012. It is in this spirit that I ask today two questions:
First question: WHY REDUCE THE POLICE AND GENDARMERIE BY AT LEAST 9,000 UNITS BETWEEN 2007 AND 2012?
Yet, after the New York attack, the 2004 Madrid attack with its 200 deaths had shown the danger of Islamic terrorism. This would be tragically confirmed by the Merah affair. Reducing the numbers in this context due to ideology (fewer civil servants) was not very responsible, especially since training new police officers takes time. The candidate would be more credible in his new proposals by acknowledging his mistake.
Second question: WHY SIGN THE TOUQUET AGREEMENTS IN 2003 AS MINISTER OF THE INTERIOR WHEN WE WERE ALREADY IN THE MIDDLE OF A MIGRATORY CRISIS?
These agreements, which allow British customs officers to conduct checks on French soil (the reverse is also true, but do you know many migrants going from England to France?), are outrageously favorable to perfidious Albion. What naivete on the part of the negotiator! Here too, the candidate has changed his mind, which is his right. But acknowledging his past mistake would add weight to this conversion.
Not answering these two questions is once again demonstrating his affiliation with that portion of the French right that talks so loudly and acts so weakly. A right inspired more by Tartarin of Tarascon than by General De Gaulle.
Patrick Mottard
