Macron grants citizenship reward to Malian who saved toddler
● Malian man saved four-year-old boy after scaling a five-storey building
French president Emmanuel Macron promises French citizenship to Mamoudou Gassama, 22, from Mali, at the Elysee Palace in Paris after he scaled an apartment building at the weekend to save a four-year-old child dangling from a fifth-floor balcony. Mr Gassama has been dubbed ‘Spiderman of the 18th’
A migrant from Mali lauded as a hero for scaling an apartment building in Paris to save a young child dangling from a balcony will be rewarded for his “exceptional act” with papers to legalise his stay, French president Emmanuel Macron said.
He said 22-year-old Mamoudou Gassama, who arrived in the country a few months ago, will also be given citizenship if he wants and a job as a firefighter.
“Bravo,” Mr Macron said to Mr Gassama during a one-onone meeting in the presidential Elysee Palace that ended with the awarding of a medal from the prefecture for “courage and devotion”.
Mr Gassama’s feat went viral on social media, where he has been dubbed “Spiderman” for climbing up five floors, from balcony to balcony, and whisking a four-year-old boy to safety on Saturday night as a crowd screamed at the foot of the building in Paris’ northern 18th district.
The young man said he has papers to legally stay in Italy, where he arrived in Europe after crossing the Mediterranean after a long, rough stay in Libya.
However, he wants to join his older brother, who has lived in France for decades.
Mr Gassama, dressed in a blue jeans and white shirt, recounted his experience which took place at around 8pm on Saturday when he and friends saw a young child hanging from a fifth-floor balcony.
“I ran. I crossed the street to save him,” he told Mr Macron during a filmed portion of the meeting. He said he did not think twice, adding: “When I started to climb, it gave me courage to keep climbing.”
God “helped me” too, he said. “Thank God I saved him.”
Mr Gassama felt fear when he took the child into the apartment. “I was trembling,” he told Mr Macron.
“Because this is an exceptional act … we are obviously, today, going to regularise all your papers,” Mr Macron told him, “and if you wish we will start naturalisation procedures so you can become French.”
Mr Gassama told Mr Macron that he arrived in Italy in 2014 after more than a year in Libya, where he was arrested and beaten, “but I wasn’t discouraged”.
The French president is toughening the nation’s approach to immigration, and stressed that not all who make the treacherous journey to Europe can be welcomed, but that Mr Gassama’s actions were admirable.
“You saved a child. Without you, no-one knows what would have become of him,” the president said.
“You need courage and the capability to do that.”
Working as a firefighter corresponds with his skills, Mr Macron said, and opened the door for him to join.
“You have become an example because millions have seen you” on social media, the president said.
Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo referred to him as the “Spiderman of the 18th”, referring to the Paris district where the rescue took place, calling him an “example for all citizens”.
The French media reported that the father of the child was detained for alleged parental neglect while the mother was out of the country.
Mamadou Gassama, the man filmed climbing up the outside of a Paris apartment block to save a child dangling from a fourth-floor balcony, is a hero. It goes without saying that he deserves every bit of praise for his bravery.
But there is something unsettling about his summons to the Elysée Palace to be hailed by French president Emmanuel Macron. Because Gassama also happens to be from Mali and, at the time of his dramatic “Spiderman” rescue, was living in France without legal status.
One fact is incidental to the other – except that by leaving his war-torn, impoverished homeland, possibly forever, to go to an unfamiliar place without secure means of support, Gassama already revealed his bravery.
Moving country to make a better life is a human right, enshrined in the UN’S Universal Declaration. Gassama already earned his chance to live as a member of society. It can’t be handed to him as a prize, or worse, used as a photo opportunity by a government whose policies would, under different circumstances, deny him that same right. The reality in France, the UK, US and many other places is that most people like Gassama will encounter racism and exclusion rather than a call to heroism in front of an audience with smartphones. The arbitrariness of it all would be farcical if it wasn’t cruel. The fact he is reportedly being offered a job with the Sapeurs Pompiers de Paris, the French capital’s famous military fire brigade, underlines the absurdity: here is potential that any society would want, only fulfilled because a child climbed over a balcony railing. Rather than offering an occasion for selfcongratulation, Gassama’s story should, like the Windrush scandal, warn against shifting the line been “good” and “bad” migrants. Because if being a superhero is the threshold for migrant virtue, it’s clear who the villains are.