“What we have seen for ten years, since Autopia 56 has existed is the lack of political will,” lambasted Yann Manzi, general delegate of Utopia 56, Wednesday with the Radio France agency.
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Posted on 08/06/2025 08:47
Reading time: 2min
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Saying people in front of the Paris City Hall on August 5, 2025. (Stephane de Sakutin / AFP)
Nearly 230 homeless people spent the night from Tuesday to Wednesday in front of the Paris town hall and intend to stay there until the state offers emergency accommodation solutions, the Radio France agency learned from Utopia 56 Wednesday, August 6.
The association for aid to foreigners specifies that those mobilized are only families. There are pregnant women and around 80 children: 17 of them are under 3 years old, and there are about fifteen minor girls, according to the Utopia 56 count. “It is not only exiles or undocumented primary arrivals, there are also people who have French nationality or stay titles, but who have changed in misery and who no longer have the possibility of obtaining housing”underlines Yann Manzi, general delegate of Utopia 56, at the Radio France agency.
“The police remained as a faction, there was no violence,” Relates Yann Manzi, who also camped this night on the forecourt of the Paris City Hall. “The Paris town hall went to see us last night (Tuesday), we are waiting for news from them”. But it is from the state that Autopia 56 expects emergency accommodation solutions. The association awaits the visit of a representative of the Prefecture of Île-de-France. In recent months, “The town hall of Paris has tried to find solutions by opening gymnasiums or other locals, but it is up to the State to act and not to rest this charge on local elected officials”, Pointe Yann Manzi.
State representatives “Say us: ‘We have never created so many emergency accommodation’, and yet there have never been so many people, 350,000, on the street in France”, deplores the general delegate of Utopia 56. “What we have seen for ten years since Autopia 56 has existed is the lack of political will”, he criticizes, calling for the requisition of empty buildings and “Millions of empty square meters and empty offices in Paris”.
