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It was one morning, at the rush hour when parents drop their children off at school. A father parks in a space for disabled people which is not intended for him. The kind of incivility that Françoise Giroux-Mallot, the mayor (without label) of Saint-Amant-de-Boixe (Charente), a town of fourteen hundred inhabitants north of Angoulême, “can’t stand”. Present on the scene, she points it out to him. In response, the 68-year-old elected official receives a statement in the face: “Do your duty as an elected official and shut your mouth!” » The scene takes place in front of the 8-year-old daughter of the father concerned.
For Françoise Giroux-Mallot, it’s too much. She noted the vehicle’s license plate and filed a complaint the next day. The fine in favor of the municipality amounts to 850 euros. But the councilor wonders: how to recover the amount? Is it up to her to take care of it? Françoise Giroux-Mallot is taken from procedure to procedure. “It has to follow behind, otherwise it will start again,” she blurted, decided. But from there to ringing the doorbell of the local resident concerned…
Elected officials gathered this March 14 in Luxé, in Charente, recount many of these types of incidents. That day, there were nine of them, all from Charente municipalities, who came to attend training against violence against mayors and their deputies. Gathered around a large table in the main room of the town hall, they are attentive to the advice given by Xavier and Thomas (the first names have been changed at their request), gendarmes referents of the network of negotiators of Nouvelle-Aquitaine, under the aegis of the intervention group of the national gendarmerie.
No more demands, impatience, irritability
Supported by a well-established PowerPoint document, the two men explain in the preamble how the brain reacts to a stressful situation, then detail the possible reactions. They illustrate their point with several examples, including that of the hostage-taking in the Hyper Cacher terrorist attack in Paris in January 2015: a man immediately threw a can of peas at the hostage-taker. . A useless gesture which could have had dramatic consequences.
The objective of the session: to dissect stressful situations, to list possible solutions. Starting with listening, intended to show the consideration given to the annoyed administrator. Then the offer of a solution, whatever it may be, to defuse the conflict.
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