The opening party on the Seine, despite all the conflicts

Although it seems unnecessary or extemporaneous, that Thomas Bach, president of the IOC, insisted hours ago that the opening ceremony of Paris 2024 will take place, fundamentally, along 6 kilometers of the route of the Seine River, it responds, no more and no less, to the different sources of conflict that cross different regions of the planet. Although the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the various episodes that occurred in the Gaza Strip, later expanded by the crossings between Iranians and Israelis, seem to be focused situations, terrorist attacks, whether organic or as a lone wolf, keep the planet’s main intelligence agencies on alert. Precisely there, in the possibility of an isolated attack, lies the insistence on consulting regarding the existence or not of a Plan B for the Olympic party.

“The French authorities are considering all the scenarios and are updating the situation on a daily basis. Unfortunately, this is a time when any important event involves a sense of stress regarding the security system. However, the French have been working on the subject for a long time and we have full confidence in them. It’s going to be a unique experience,” Bach said.

Somehow, it’s the price to pay for the decision to hold the first ceremony of this magnitude outside a stadium that, in and of itself, sounds reasonable considering what the Seine represents as a Parisian icon and the entire city as a synthesis of the most beautiful spaces in universal architecture.

However, this is not the first time that an important celebration has been held in this way.

Although in scale, the opening of the YOG Buenos Aires 2018 was a kind of foundational test for what we are going to experience next July. People from the French organization recognize that this party with hundreds of thousands of people witnessing the parade of athletes and the artistic numbers along a couple of kilometers of the mythical 9 de Julio Avenue - Argentines call it “the widest in the world” - was a source of inspiration in this regard.

Not only in terms of the concept or the possibility of opening the party to hundreds of thousands of spectators without even paying for a ticket, but also in terms of the organization of the security system.

Although on that occasion both the national and municipal governments responded to the same political sign, by the date of the elections, an economic crisis began to become notorious, which would lead the ruling party to a defeat in the 2019 presidential elections. Against any prediction, the celebration was full and represented the prelude to two weeks in which there were no empty spaces left in any of the stadiums, regardless of the participation and success of local athletes. It was a real massive boost for the Youth Games.

The other mega-event whose inauguration took place outside a stadium has already been summarized in this same space, it was in 1998, it was at a FIFA World Cup, and it was in Paris...

At that time, the celebration invaded a large part of the symbolic spaces of the French capital, with those four giants moving from equidistant points on their way to the Plaza de la Concorde.

It was an event considered almost bizarre by a sector of the press, especially because of an unfinished ending, among other things, because an unexpected rain frustrated the original idea that an explosion of fireworks would give us a Paris By Night. None of that happened. However, in many countries, television networks celebrated high audience levels for the tour that occupied more than four hours of airtime.

Clearly, even with what little was officially announced, the celebration of next July 26th will have a different profile, beyond the creative bias given to it by the screenwriters. Fundamentally because the main protagonists will not be four dolls representing an equal number of races but the thousands of athletes from more than 200 countries who will disembark after a long and beautiful boat ride.

In this regard, in those same statements, Bach confirmed that there will be Russian and Belarusian athletes participating in the competitions, even in reduced doses, but that they will not be allowed to participate in the opening parade. “According to our tradition, we cannot punish the athlete for what their political leaders do. That’s why we invite them to compete as neutrals but they won’t be able to parade. We cannot ignore that this is the consequence of the violation of the Olympic Charter by the Russian Olympic Committee and because, as a side effect of the invasion, they have annexed sports organizations on the territory of the Ukrainian Olympic Committee,” added Bach.

Beyond the clarity of the message of the head of the IOC, it seems that, in different aspects, there are still things to evaluate, discuss and resolve, even if we are less than three months away from the Olympic party.