Despite doubts about the cleanliness of the river where the open water swimming events of the Olympic Games will take place, Anne Hidalgo should swim in the Seine on June 23. With Emmanuel Macron?
A dive that will go down in history. On June 23, Anne Hidalgo will swim in the Seine, to prove that swimming in the river presents no danger while the site will host events for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, which will be held from July 26 to August 11. The socialist mayor of the capital will dive into the river alongside Laurent Nunez, the Paris police prefect, and Marc Guillaume, the prefect of the Île-de-France region, indicates The Parisian.
Emmanuel Macron could also take part. His entourage has not yet formalized his participation, but assures that the head of state “will take a good swim in the Seine before the Olympic Games”. On the occasion of the inauguration of the Olympic village last February, the President of the Republic was delighted at the idea of swimming in “a river which will have changed its face and use for the day of After”. In the event of bad weather conditions, this dip in the Seine on June 23, Olympic and Paralympic day, could however be postponed, warns Anne Hidalgo’s entourage. “All the ‘gnagnagna’, I tell you, yes we are going to swim” “I know, there are still plenty of skeptical people, who say ‘gnagnagna’, ‘gnagnagna’. So all the ‘gnagnagna’, I tell you say, yes we are going to swim, because we have done what is necessary to make the Seine swimmable”, announced the mayor of Paris last April.
Jacques Chirac’s promise
A “historic” plunge which will occur more than thirty years after Jacques Chirac’s promise. In 1990, the former President of the Republic, who was then still only mayor of the capital, had promised to “bathe in the Seine in front of witnesses” in 1993, i.e. at the time 70 years after the start of the ban on swimming in the Seine enacted in 1923 by prefectural decree. A commitment that Jacques Chirac ultimately did not keep. In July 2023, Anne Hidalgo also announced the opening of three swimming sites to the general public from the summer of 2025 in Paris: in Bercy, Grenelle and between Île Saint-Louis and the Marais.