They arrived from Baghlan, a city of over 100,000 people north of Kabul, in September 2021. The Mamozai brothers, Abdelrahman (25) and Bilal (22), now work on the assembly line at the Stellantis plant in Sochaux in eastern France. It wasn't their original jobs; they were both in sales. Today, they specialize in "body cladding" on a site that produces a car every 60 seconds, the Peugeot 3008 or 5008, electric, hybrid or rechargeable hybrid models worth over €40,000. Keeping up with the pace is essential.
In this factory employing 6,000 people, including 1,000 temporary workers, they are not the only refugees. "We have 58 nationalities," explained Séverine Brisson, the employment manager. Two years ago, in September 2022, while giving the press a tour of this site, which has been completely reorganized to be more compact and efficient, a manager pointed out the recent presence of Ukrainian refugees on the line, "including a couple, both lawyers."
On September 13, 2023, as Peugeot brand manager Linda Jackson presented the new 3008 to rental companies (including Avis, Hertz, Europcar), young Syrians posed all smiles for Le Monde's photographer. A year later, on October 3, Elsa Pattarozzi, head of the training workshop, introduced Carlos Tavares, CEO of Stellantis, and Marc Ferracci, industry minister, to a Turkish woman in her thirties, who has lived in the nearby city of Montbéliard for nine years, as well as a young recruit from a low-income neighborhood and an Afghan refugee. Géraldine Grangier, the Rassemblement National (RN, far-right) MP for the region, who attended the visit, was unfazed. "Without immigration, we don't know how to operate in the industry," noted Ferracci about 10 days later on France Inter radio, when asked about a potential new immigration law.
After being trained, they joined the new night shift and began work on Monday, November 4. Sales of the Peugeot 3008 are off to a good start: 75,000 orders, a quarter of them for electric models, have already been booked. Nine temporary employment agencies, selected by Stellantis, have started recruiting 450 workers (half of them for day shifts). Refugees are welcome. At the plant, half the temporary workers are foreigners.
In the hands-on training room of the vocational school, a few dozen meters from the assembly line, trainees of four different nationalities sat in a small open cabin equipped with tools to practice electrical connections. They have to make the right connections for the right equipment, in the right order and... quickly.
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