FROM OUR CORRESPONDENT
PARIS — Throwing tear gas and burning bins. First clashes near the Assemblée Nationale between the police and the people who arrived to protest against the lack of confidence in the government by just 9 votes. Spontaneous demonstrations are also taking place in Strasbourg, Lyon, Toulouse, Dijon and Lille. It is the consequence of the vote in Parliament that “saved” President Emmanuel Macron and consequently his pension reform.
In fact, the motion of censure against the government of Elisabeth Borne collected 278 votes: only nine were missing to reach an absolute majority.According to article 49.3 of the French Constitution, the government remains in office and the pension reform is adopted by the Parliament. It should enter into force on 1 September, but in the coming weeks and months the struggle of the opponents to prevent it will intensify.
France is experiencing a moment of serious political and social crisis, the debate in the National Assembly was marked by shouts and violent protests, after the announcement of the result at 7 pm the first demonstrators immediately flocked to place Vauban, in front of the cathedral of the Invalides, for a spontaneous gathering and prohibited by the prefecture, e anger and mobilization are expected to grow in the coming hoursbeyond the day of strikes and marches already declared for Thursday 23 March.
Just a few minutes after the vote, spontaneous demonstrations multiplied. Dozens of people began to gather in place Vauban, near the National Assembly, shouting slogans such as “Macron resign” and setting fire to rubbish bins. They didn’t miss tensions with the police, who charged protesters and threw smoke bombs in an attempt to disperse them. Groups of protesters also gathered in the Saint-Lazare station, in the Opera area, where incidents of looting were reported, and along rue Reaumur, rue de Rivoli and rue Montmartre. Some have raised barricades using barriers, garbage bags and material stolen from road construction sites. Over the course of the evening the police arrested seventy people.
The protest has also spread to the main centers of the country, from Nantes to Toulouse, from Rouen to Strasbourg. In Dijon, in the place de la République, the crowd destroyed the bus shelters and chanted the Marseillaise. In the capital and in Bordeaux, students have occupied universities in protest.
The trade unions – united for once – and the opposition parties do not intend to give upalso encouraged by the very narrow margin of victory of the government: it was expected that the missing votes were 20 or 30, and not 9. On the benches of Nupes, the coalition of the radical left, signs immediately appeared with the words On continue (it continues ) and RIP, or popular initiative referendum.
Opponents organized a referendum to reject once and for all a reform judged unjust. According to reports from Le Figaro, the request for popular consultation – signed by 250 deputies and senators and presented to the president of the Assembly Yael Braun-Pivet – was sent to the Constitutional Court, which now has one month to examine it.
Deputy François Ruffin, supported by many colleagues, asks Macron not to promulgate the law, as President Chirac and his premier Dominique de Villepin did in 2006 with the CPE (first job contract), after four months of violent popular protests .
The other path chosen by the opponents is recourse to the Constitutional Council, which will have to pronounce itself within a month and could reject the reform entirely (remote eventuality) or in part. At least for tonight, Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne remains in office, but she herself considers herself “a fuse” and could be replaced by another personality, perhaps the current Interior Minister, Gérald Darmanin, in a profound cabinet reshuffle that it seems inevitable.
In any case, President Macron will remain at the Elysée until 2027, but must now find a way to appease the popular protests and to get out of a deep political crisis. Macron hoped that the Républicains, the Gaullist right that is not part of the relative majority in government, would support the pension reform which would then be the first step towards a more structured alliance in Parliament until an absolute majority was achieved. This was not the case, the 61 deputies of the Républicains not only last week would not have voted for the reform – which is why the government has decided to override Parliament by resorting to article 49.3 – but tonight many of them voted on the motion of censure against the government, coming one step away from approval.
Tomorrow morning has been arranged a summit at the Elysée between Macron, Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne and the leaders of the government coalition. In the evening, the president will instead receive the majority parliamentarians.
(He cooperated Joseph Scuotri)