The examination of the text on the vaccine pass was once more suspended in the middle of the night on Wednesday January 5 due to the storm caused in the Assembly by the president, who said he wanted “Piss off” the unvaccinated. Comments which show that Emmanuel Macron is determined to further politicize the debate on vaccines a few months before the presidential election, believes the foreign press.
Emmanuel Macron has he “Lost your head in the face of antivax” ? This is what the conservative Italian daily wonders on Tuesday. Il Time, who is surprised, like many other titles in the international press, by the latest statements by the French president during an interview with readers of the Parisian.
“Customary with scathing statements, at the risk of triggering a lively controversy”, the tenant of the Élysée is there “Targeted at unvaccinated people”, claiming that he had “Really want to piss them off” limiting “As much as possible access to activities of social life”, thanks to the vaccination pass, report The weather. For the Swiss daily, the head of state “Raise the tone to mark the importance of the vaccination campaign as the Omicron variant increases contamination in the country”.
Agreement on the thorny issue of the vaccination pass for minors
From “Blatant declarations”, considers the Belgian daily Echo, which did not fail to ignite the powder in the National Assembly, where the examination of the bill on the vaccine pass was once more suspended in the middle of the night.
However, the debates had initially calmed down on Tuesday at the end of the day: the deputies had managed to agree on the thorny issue of the vaccination pass for minors, postponed from 12 to 16 years for school trips and peri and extracurricular, but not for private activities such as going to a restaurant.
The broadcast of Emmanuel Macron’s statements once more rocked the hemicycle a little later in the evening. Several opposition politicians in particular called in vain for the immediate arrival of the Prime Minister, Jean Castex, in the Assembly to explain the line of the executive following the president’s remarks.
“A prudent political calculation”
“By attacking the unvaccinated”, Emmanuel Macron shows that it seems “Determined to further politicize the debate on vaccinations, three months before the French presidential election”, note Euronews, also noting that the French president’s short sentence might be a nod to a comment by Georges Pompidou, who said in 1966 that it was time d’“Stop pissing off the French”, when he was Prime Minister.
“Even though the language is coarse and might provoke extreme or even violent reactions from anti-vaccine agents, analysts believe the president’s remarks appear to reflect a cautious political calculation,” underlines the correspondent of Guardian in Paris Jon Henley. Car “The polls show that a large majority of French voters are increasingly frustrated by the pandemic and that they support the vaccination pass as an effective means of putting an end to it”, concludes the journalist. Among those who are opposed [au pass], very few are likely to vote for Macron. ”
Noémie Taylor-Rosner
