President of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) Andrew Parsons was in Paris for a few days at the end of August for the beginning of the one-year countdown to the 2024 Paralympic Games (August 28 to September 8). From accessibility to the opening ceremony to Russian participation, the Brazilian leader spoke to Le Monde about the major issues facing the Paralympic movement less than 365 days before the opening ceremony on Place de la Concorde.
Paris faces many challenges, not least that of making its transport networks more accessible to people with disabilities. But we also understand what this means, here in France, in terms of cost and legislation.
Sometimes it's possible to do things in some cities, but not in others. In Tokyo, it was more a question of changing perspective than making the city accessible, because it already was. The city of Paris has made a major effort, investing €125 million in making its ground transportation network accessible. So, yes, we are more satisfied than last year, as we see the legacy of the Paralympic Games taking shape.
I have no doubt. The Organizing Committee and the Paris City Council have the ambition to make next year's Games revolutionary, with the same logo for the Olympic and Paralympic Games, opening ceremonies outside the stadium...
But that's what we expect from an organizing committee, that they challenge us and suggest new things. Honestly, if someone had said 10 years ago that they were organizing the opening ceremony outside a stadium, we'd have said, "Stop it, you're joking." But years from now we'll remember that the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Games was the first in Paralympic history to be held outside a stadium.
Yes, it's true, at first we were skeptical about the organizers' ambitions. But then they explained their concept, the plans, and we realized that it was a fantastic idea.
London 2012 is still the benchmark, the English have taken the Paralympic movement to an unprecedented level of international recognition, and Paris can do the same in other respects. It's been a long time since we've had spectators [the Summer Games in Tokyo and the Winter Games in Beijing were held behind closed doors because of Covid], so we want the Paris Games not only to be spectacular but also to change society.
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