April Fools Joke IN France Taken Way Too Far By A Government Official!

Caroline Cayeux is the mayor of Beauvais, France and decided to play an April fools joke on her citizens, only no one was laughing…

The politician announced that about 4,000 new jobs were coming because IKEA was setting up shop in their town!

Cayeux took to Twitter first thing Sunday morning to share what people thought was a really incredible piece of news, writing “IKEA will soon be moving to #Beauvais in the NOVAPARC zone!

“This is excellent news for dynamism and employment in Beauvais! This is the culmination of a long struggle with other cities in the north of France! I have fought and I welcome it!”  People were STOKED at the idea of an IKEA hitting Beauvais

Four hours later, Cayeux tweeted that her announcement was a #PoissonDAvril (a.k.a. an April Fool’s joke), but that she’s still fighting to bring the big box furniture store to the city.

IKEA s’installera bientôt à #Beauvais dans la zone Novaparc! C’est une excellente nouvelle pour le dynamisme et l’emploi à Beauvais et dans le Beauvaisis! C’est l’aboutissement d’une longue lutte avec d’autres villes du Nord de la France! Je me suis battue et je m’en félicite! pic.twitter.com/NRSgViPZy1

— Caroline Cayeux (@carolinecayeux) April 1, 2018

L’annonce de l’installation de IKEA à #Beauvais était un #PoissonDAvril. Mes équipes ont bien contacté l’enseigne mais elle nous a indiqué qu’elle ne s’implante que dans les métropoles. Le développement de la zone d’activités Novaparc va permettre de relancer le dossier! pic.twitter.com/osLOiGzS5F

— Caroline Cayeux (@carolinecayeux) April 1, 2018

The mayor later apologized saying that her sense of humour wasn’t shared by everyone perhaps because the unemployment rate is very high in this town…

So…

One mayor in France thought it was “funny” to celebrate April’s fool day announcing the arrival of Ikea in the city, with 4000 jobs

Shockingly, people are not laughing much now that it has been revealed to be a joke

I mean… woah, such cruelty😶https://t.co/xcZV8IAlHr

— Matthieu Chassain (@MattC_Journo) April 2, 2018

A bit of context : unemployment is about 20% according to the national statistics office (INSEE), located an hour drive north of Paris and mostly known only because of its airport which is where most of the low cost flights would land, not in the airports near Paris.

— Matthieu Chassain (@MattC_Journo) April 2, 2018