Having been at the helm of the Marne SDIS fire service for barely five months, Colonel Jérôme Vincent has been told to pack his bags and leave by this summer. This is an unexpected and sudden turn of events, which may have been instigated by the president of the department, who is also chairman of the SDIS 51 board of directors.
The authorities – the prefect and the departmental authorities – have declined to comment, and the colonel, despite having been widely supported by them when he took up his post last January, has declined to comment. This leaves the question unanswered: why does he have to leave so suddenly?
A slip-up?
A trade union, contacted by our editorial team, was also unable to provide an answer. This only serves to fuel the mystery, even if some people may have an idea. “During a meeting, the colonel ended a speech by exclaiming ‘I’m a bit of a monkey’ or ‘monkey skin’, memories differ – an expression intended to ward off bad luck, but which he uttered whilst placing his hand on an officer… of Guyanese origin.
"It didn’t go down well", "He took it very badly", according to sources close to the officer (who also does not wish to comment), as reported by our colleagues in the local press. Colonel Vincent is said to have apologised immediately, in the presence of President Desautels, who was attending the meeting. An insufficient mea culpa. Unless…
An officer who was ‘exemplary, rigorous and uncompromising when it came to discipline’
According to the union, many firefighters cannot imagine that their chief would have committed a deliberately racist act, but rather see it as a huge blunder of which he was not even aware at the time. “I remember him as an exemplary officer, rigorous, uncompromising when it came to discipline, and someone whom one could certainly not suspect of racism”, says someone who knew him when he was stationed in Saint-Quentin from 2006 to 2014. Comment from a firefighter in the Marne: “It’s a huge blunder, granted, but it could have been sorted out with an apology and some internal explanations. It seems a bit far-fetched to us that this was the only reason for sacking him. There must be something else.”
Operations called into question
“All too often, the fire and rescue services are used as political tools. It’s becoming a disgrace! Such services should, just like the police and the gendarmerie, be managed directly by the State.”, says a firefighter from another department.