“The problem is the workforce,” said Pierre Blasieux, president of the French Private Security Federation. “Will we have enough security to adequately secure the event? We need to step on the gas.”
He said Olympic organizers had “struggled to find a company” through four contract bids.
Particularly difficult is the task of managing the 104,000 ticketed spectators on the lower Seine during the opening ceremony's water boat parade on July 26th. President Emmanuel Macron said the event would only be rescheduled if there was a clear and imminent threat of terrorism, either at Place de la Trocadéro, facing the Eiffel Tower, or at the national stadium, the Stade de France.
Bruno le Rey, head of security for the Paris 2024 Games, told Le Monde newspaper last week: “We were unable to persuade companies to hold the ceremony.”
Some private security companies were reluctant to bid because they did not want to be responsible for a contract they might not be able to fulfill. Even before the Olympics, the industry assessed it was dealing with a labor shortage of 20,000 people. There are concerted efforts to get more people trained and certified, including through three-week accelerated courses funded by France's unemployment agency and local governments, but that may not be enough. There is.
Sports Minister Amélie Houdea-Castella said in a television interview last week that the sports sector needs to hire an additional 8,000 people to have enough staff for all the sports at the Olympics in Paris.
Above all, French authorities want to limit the Olympics' vulnerability to terrorism, crowd crushing and other security threats. They are also wary of embarrassing incidents like the one at the 2012 London Olympics, when the military had to be called in to search handbags after a private security company failed to fulfill its contract. There is.
Some officials dismissed concerns, saying more than 20,000 people had been newly trained or were in the process of training. By July, they must at least be certified to work at major events, such as bag searches and patrol downs, interacting with crowds, monitoring suspicious activity and other basic security tasks.
“There are no failures. We have achieved the goals we set for ourselves,” Marc Guillaume, chief executive of the Ile-de-France region, said at a press conference on Thursday.
However, private security experts say, while appreciating the government's efforts, authorities are overestimating the number of contractors available, and that the number of contractors working in conjunction with the Olympics, including at airports, train stations, and transportation facilities, as well as at competition venues, is increasing. He said he may have underestimated the number of contractors needed this summer. Department store.
Blajou said the Olympics would pose “problems in terms of geography and timing.”
The Olympics are held in late July and August, which is traditionally a holiday for about a third of France's security contractors. And many of the country's certified contractors don't live in the Paris area, where the majority of the competitions are held. They may not want to work long hours in the intense Parisian heat and spend weeks in the capital without their families.
Backed by newly trained personnel. However, not all of them will be selected for the Olympics. Typically, only about 60 percent of those trained end up in private security jobs, according to industry estimates. Additionally, this training is not Olympic-specific, so those who receive the certification this year could be employed for the Olympics or on construction sites, or to replace those who have left the field. There is sex.
Brajeu said things could still get better. Final recruitment efforts are currently underway with the aim of attracting last-minute candidates, including students. “If there is a big wave of candidates, we have the ability to train them,” he said. There are sufficient training facilities. ”
“People think you have to do karate to work in private security, but that's not the case,” he says.
Some applicants for Olympic roles have raised safety concerns themselves.
Authorities tested only a small fraction of the 1 million people they were assessing before the start of the Games. However, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said 800 people had been excluded from participating, including 15 who were on the national security watch list as of late March.
“There are people who wanted to sign up to carry the torch or volunteer for the Olympics, but clearly they didn't have good intentions,” Darmanin said.
He noted that authorities are testing all private security certificate holders “as a precautionary measure” in case they may be asked to help at the Olympics. The Home Office issued warnings to 1,392 people, including 102 who were on the watch list.
By early April, the total number of people excluded because they were on the watch list appears to have increased from 117 to 161, according to Darmanin. Of these, 105 were Islamic extremists, 35 were far-right, 18 were far-left, and 3 were foreigners. interference. Almost all of them were French.
While these findings may certainly reflect “potential infiltration” by extremist groups such as Islamic State Khorasan, which has strongholds in Afghanistan and Pakistan, other dynamics are also at play. French terrorism researcher Marc Hecker warns that
“The watch list is pretty extensive,” he says. Some people may have gotten it by mistake. Others have been accused or convicted of extremism-related crimes at some point, but are seriously trying to re-enter the labor market.
Blajou said he is not concerned about excluding security contractors. He noted that less than 1% of security guards had been warned by authorities, which he said was “on the contrary reassuring.” He added that while 280,000 people have been tested, “only about 180,000 people are actually working in this field.” Some have changed their professions, and some have passed away. ”
The Paris 2024 security plan includes support from around 50 countries, in addition to France's private security, police and military, with a total of 2,500 police officers and an array of equipment expected to be deployed. It is.
Darmanin said their focus will be on “ensuring the safety of our teams, lending anti-drug, anti-bomb and anti-weapon dogs, and communicating with our compatriots.” He added that they may be armed.
Poland It announced it would deploy soldiers, including dog trainers, to focus on explosive detection and counter-terrorism.Last week in Rabat, he thank you morocco He was recognized as one of those who agreed to send law enforcement officers this summer as Qatar's security committee visited the Gendarmerie headquarters in Paris to plan arrangements.
As France sent officials to Qatar to help secure the 2022 soccer World Cup, French parliamentarians criticized Qatar's human rights record. This year's deal reduces public scrutiny within France.
Hans-Jacob Schindler, senior director of the Counter-Extremism Project, said such agreements, which have been signed during major events in the past, would increase French police's “ability to respond to individuals who speak the participating languages.” said that it is likely to be useful. team. ”
However, coordinating the safety of this high-risk Olympic Games remains difficult, even with international support.
“I definitely don't want to be in charge of this year's Olympics in France,” Schindler said.
