(Deutsche Welle) No one at the school “The Eucalypts” in the village of Ollioules, near the Mediterranean coast in southern France, wants to talk to the media anymore. Sandra Olivier, maths teacher and member of the teachers’ union SNES-FSU, turned down DW’s interview request via text message: “We would like to regain a peaceful atmosphere,” she wrote.
Local mayor Robert Beneventi from the center-right party Les Republicains (LR) also declined our enquiry. It had been his idea to rename the middle school after Samuel Paty, a history teacher beheaded by a radicalized Islamist near Paris in October last year.
But Beneventi had to drop the plans — after they had met with resistance by teachers, parents and pupils. It’s a backlash that has caused a heated debate and shows how divided French society is when it comes to secularism.
