Trouble-party
To the authorities who would like to shield migrants from the eyes of passers-by, Yann Manzi and his association, Utopia 56, respond by setting up ephemeral camps on one of the most symbolic places in Paris: the Place de la République. This was already the case on November 23, 2020. The violent images of the police evacuation of the exiles had then made the rounds of news channels and social networks, shocking even the Minister of the Interior, Gerald Darmanin. This was still the case on March 25, 2021, on the occasion of the Night of Solidarity. This time, the prefecture of the Île-de-France region announced the next day the sheltering of 502 people, of whom 124 were families or were isolated women and 378 were single men, ” without incident “. Objective of these operations: to maintain permanent pressure on the State.
Festival manager
The Utopia 56 adventure began in 2015, in the midst of the refugee crisis. Shocked by the images of the drowning of little Aylan Kurdi on a beach in Turkey, Yann Manzi, his wife and his son leave Morbihan for Calais. They begin to deal with waste management in the “jungle”, where more than 10,000 people were crowded. Six years later, with eight branches throughout France and more than 8,000 volunteers, the same know-how is still mobilized at Utopia. Yann Manzi, 54, was a festival manager and worked in particular for the organization of Vieilles Charrues, in Finistère. He specializes in the management of mass events, where food, health, violence and drugs issues must be taken care of.
Humanist activist
Yann Manzi defines himself as a man “Rather leftist”, “green at heart”, “Humanist above all” and ” citizen of the world “. In the 1990s, he participated in the Ras l’front movement, against Jean-Marie Le Pen. He then joined the punk movement, that of Bérurier Noir. Thirty years later, he is alarmed by the Place du Rassemblement national and his uninhibited speeches. A commitment that comes to him from his own family experience. Italian, his father had migrated to Algeria, which was still French. A “Pied-noir not French even if French” who will be familiar with the experience of racism.
Volunteer Network
The association was founded as a family and aims to be a collective and inter-association project. Today, its president is none other than Yann Manzi’s son, Gaël, 34, who works there on a voluntary basis, like his father. The latter wants to give pride of place to this“Utopia youth”, hundreds of activists mobilized throughout France. Most are aged 18 to 27, often precarious, sometimes in the RSA, who choose to work alongside the refugees. A social project within the humanitarian project.