PARIS. Unions and left-wing oppositions throw a new gauntlet at French President Emmanuel Macron with the second day of protests against the pension reform, which provides for the raising of the retirement age from 62 to 64 years. The objective of the mobilization is to repeat, if not improve, the dynamics recorded on the occasion of the first day held last January 19, when more than a million people took to the streets according to the Ministry of the Interior, while the trade union CGT counted more than two million.
The reportage- We are students and poor: this is our Paris
From the first figures that are arriving from the various marches and rallies organized throughout the territory, participation remains important in the streets, despite the fact that the rate of participation in strikes is declining in almost all sectors, such as education, energy or of transport. In Paris, where the march launched from the Place d’Italie in the direction of Montparnasse, the CGT trade union counted 500,000 demonstrators, against 400,000 two weeks ago. For fear of clashes, the Interior Ministry has deployed 4 thousand agents in the capital, for a total of 11 thousand throughout the territory. “It is one of the largest demonstrations organized in our country for about ten years,” said Laurent Berger, secretary of the CFDT union on the sidelines of the Parisian procession. From Marseilles, the leader of France Insoumise, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, declared that “Macron is certain to lose”. “It is an absolutely exceptional situation” added the tribune of the French left, who like the other left-wing parties requires a referendum on the project which, according to him, “no one wants”. A position also confirmed by all the latest polls, according to which a large majority of French people are against it. Even the leader of the Rassemblement National Marine Le Pen, who did not take to the streets to demonstrate, spoke of a “more important mobilization” than the previous one, arguing that the reform in the pipeline is “useless and brutal”.
For its part, the government seems determined to go straight on the road announced. After affirming yesterday that the 64-year threshold “is no longer negotiable”, Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne today affirmed before the Macronian deputies that “the majority will remain united” in completing the reform project. The support of the Republicans will be fundamental, the only one among the large formations to show signs of openness in this sense. The text began its parliamentary process landing in the National Assembly, where the debate had very harsh tones from the very first moments.