After the assassination of Samuel Paty, Christian Estrosi is calling for a firm and appropriate response from mayors and the State to protect schools, colleges, and high schools in France: “For several years, I have been demanding appropriate security measures to combat the enemy: video surveillance systems, facial recognition, armed police officers in schools, sharing information on individuals monitored for potential radicalization…”
Referring to the agreement implemented in January 2018 with the Minister of National Education, Jean-Michel Blanquier, an experiment in 18 schools in the city to support the educational community in access control, visual and perimeter site security, managing entrances and exits, providing security advice, presenting the dangers of the Internet and cybercrime, road safety prevention and initiation, but also breaches of secularism, the Mayor of Nice considers that “a proven system, 100% of school principals wished to continue the experiment and praised the merits of having a police officer in their institution. Other institutions have already requested to host a municipal police officer next year.”
Buoyed by this experience, Christian Estrosi is firm: “It is more necessary than ever for the educational community to be supported,” before adding, “It is because mayors have an acute knowledge of their territory, their neighborhoods, that they have a crucial role to play in the response needed.”
To follow up, he wrote to the Prime Minister to propose that this experiment be extended to all schools in Nice, as well as to colleges and high schools.
For him, “the presence of a police officer tasked with supporting the educational community and who could be, on-site or remotely, the reference point and confidant for breaches of secularism can only be a mark of seriousness.”
We are waiting for the Ministry’s response to know whether this proposal will be acted upon or not.
