Macron plans to swim in murky Seine

PARIS, France (AFP) — Emmanuel Macron still plans to swim in the River Seine as promised but “not necessarily” before the Paris Olympic Games which begin in a week, the Elysee presidential office said on Friday.

The French president has insisted several times that he would dive into the capital’s river to highlight the possibility of swimming there again thanks to major depollution work, and to reassure about the quality of the water.

But Macron, 46, never set a date, and did not join Sports Minister Amelie Oudea-Castera and Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo who both took a dip in the murky waters in the past week.

“He didn’t announce that he was going to swim before the Olympics, he announced that he was going to swim and he has always expressed this certainty,” a spokesperson for the president told journalists on Friday.

“He will not necessarily have the opportunity to do so before the Games.”

A presidential adviser clarified that no date had been set. “As he said when he announced it, what seems essential to him beyond the fact that it allows us to organise Olympic competitions, is that it will above all allow us to open swimming sites for all the numerous residents of the Ile-de-France region in the years to come,” the adviser continued.