Sarkozy visit cost €2.35m claims MP
Opposition say president’s visit to Nancy was a ‘political conference in disguise’ which caused mayhem for residents.
PRESIDENT Sarkozy’s visit to Nancy on Tuesday generated an “economic loss” of 2.35 million euros, the opposition has claimed.
Socialist party MP for the Meurthe-et-Moselle Jean-Yves Le Déaut claimed his calculations made the cost of Sarkozy’s visit “one of the most expensive for French taxpayers.”
Sarkozy spent two hours at the city’s CHU (centre hospitalier universitaire) to defend the new plan for governing the hospital, and visited Velaines-en-Hayes, near Toul, to take part in a political conference with 750 UMP supporters.
Mr Le Déaut labelled it “a political meeting disguised as a presidential visit,” which caused “record confinement” for residents who were for forced to stay at home for five hours, with “record traffic jams from 8.00” in the centre of Nancy.
He said the A131 motorway was “blocked for hours”, and there had been “a record number of police”, the MP claimed.
He calculated €200,000 for the cost of the 1,000 riot police mobilised for the visit, €150,000 for the president’s travel costs, and his entourage, and more than two million euros for the economic loss generated by the two hour blockage of some 50,000 people.
