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Mali migrant who scaled Paris building to rescue child offered French citizenship, job as firefighter

The Associated Press, May 28, 2018 7:40 am, https://globalnews.ca/news/423...zenship-firefighter/

PARIS – French President Emmanuel Macron met Monday with a migrant from Mali lauded as a hero for scaling an apartment building to save a young child dangling from a balcony. Macron said 22-year-old Mamoudou Gassama would be rewarded for his β€œexceptional act” with papers to legalize his stay, citizenship if he wants and a job as a firefighter.

β€œBravo,” Macron said to Gassama during a one-on-one meeting in a gilded room of the presidential Elysee Palace that ended with the awarding of a medal from the prefecture for β€œcourage and devotion.”

READ MORE: Paris mayor hails β€˜heroic’ Malian immigrant who scaled building to save child

Gassama’s feat went viral on social media, where he was dubbed β€œSpiderman” for climbing up five floors, from balcony to balcony, and whisking a four-year-old boy to safety 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. But he wants to join his older brother, who has lived in France for decades.

Gassama, dressed in blue jeans and white shirt, recounted his experience which took place at around 8 p.m. Saturday when he and friends saw a young child hanging from a fifth-floor balcony.

β€œI ran. I crossed the street to save him,” he told Macron. He said he didn’t think twice. β€œWhen I started to climb, it gave me courage to keep climbing.”

God β€œhelped me,” too, he said. β€œThank God I saved him.”

Gassama said he began to tremble with fear only when he took the child into the apartment.

Mamoudou Gassama, 22, from Mali, leaves the Elysee Palace after his meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron, in Paris, May 28, 2018.Mamoudou Gassama, 22, from Mali, leaves the Elysee Palace after his meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron, in Paris, May 28, 2018. --- Thibault Camus/Pool via Reuters

β€œBecause this is an exceptional act … we are obviously, today, going to regularize all your papers,” Macron told him, also offering to begin naturalization procedures so he can become French.

Macron is behind a bill toughening French immigration law, and he stressed there is no contradiction between rewarding Gassama for his act of bravery and holding firm on immigration, which the president wants to stop at its source.

READ MORE: Pope Francis baptizes Nigerian β€˜migrant hero’ who disarmed Italian thief

β€œAn exceptional act does not make policy,” he later told reporters, vowing to maintain a policy that is β€œexigent, respectful of our principles” on asylum and β€œrigorous” regarding the migratory flux.

The special treatment for Gassama comes as authorities prepare to evacuate some 2,400 migrants in makeshift encampments in the French capital, the subject of a heated debate between the Paris mayor, who wants to ensure the uprooted will be sheltered, and Interior Minister Gerard Collomb, who was present at the Elysee.

The French president said Gassama’s actions made him deserving of special treatment.

β€œYou saved a child. Without you, no one knows what would have become of him,” the president said. β€œYou need courage and the capability to do that.”

Working as a firefighter corresponds with his skills, Macron said, and opened the door for him to join.

β€œYou have become an example because millions have seen you” on social media, the president said.

The French media reported that the father of the small child was detained for alleged parental neglect.

β€”

Elaine Ganley in Paris contributed.

FM
Last edited by Former Member
ksazma posted:

I am happy that he saved the child. I do have a few observations. Why the man on the same balcony couldn’t pull the child up like Gassama did? Secondly, any dude who scales heights like that is someone you don’t want near your house.

I read up on that...there was a barrier separating him from the other balcony and he felt if he told the child to let go, the child might fall because he did not seem to have a firm grip

FM

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