At 43, Olivia Fortin signs the most unexpected of the exploits of the Marseille municipal authorities, a victory which does not however offer the city completely to the Printemps de Marseille. This business manager, specializing in the organization of events for the cinema, sport or industry, participated in her first campaign as a candidate. She comes out in the glorious costume of the tombeuse of the ultra-favorite of the ballot, the president Les Républicains (LR) of the metropolis Aix-Marseille and the department of Bouches-du-Rhône, Martine Vassal (41.78% against 39.16%).
“Tonight I haven’t lost”, however much the right-wing candidate declared, at the opening of her speech, Sunday evening June 28. The triumph obtained by Olivia Fortin in a sector where the outgoing mayor was traditionally elected in the first round eliminates it however dryly from the race for the succession of Jean-Claude Gaudin.
“We said to ourselves, this sector is impossible to win. And, frankly, nobody wanted to go. I would have been delighted to do 10% or 20%… ”, recognizes the new mayor of 4e sector, euphoric alongside his leader Michèle Rubirola in the burning Marseille night. Keeping the candidate La République en Marche (LRM) Yvon Berland (7.67%) helped his success in a tense quadrangular. But Olivia Fortin also takes full advantage of internal divisions within LR, the rejection of Jean-Claude Gaudin’s balance sheet and the case of fraudulent proxies that undermined M’s campaign.me Vassal.
“General interest rather than Tarantino cheeseburgers”
Her Parisian accent betrays her birth and adolescence far from the city, but the roots of Olivia Fortin go deep into the local terroir. She descends from one of the great bourgeois families of the flamboyant Marseille of the XIXe century. His forefathers gave up the “campaign” that made it possible to build the Saint-Joseph hospital, next to the Vélodrome stadium. His grandfather headed the chamber of commerce, and his uncle, Pierre Rastoin, a precious advisor during the campaign, was mayor of the 7e sector from 1989 to 1995 and assistant to Robert Vigouroux.
A family whose reputation has been “Really very useful”, she explains, at the time when Martine Vassal stigmatized the Printemps marseillais and her candidate as “the ultra-left”, a “red danger” wanting to sweep over the Canebière. “It helped defuse this type of attack, recognizes Olivia Fortin… But these accusations above all made the prefects and the police commissioners with whom I work on major events smile. “
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