Railway workers in Lyon demonstrated against the pension reform on March 22, 2023. Despite widespread protests, President Emmanuel Macron vowed to implement the highly contested reform before the end of the year during a televised speech on Wednesday. In response, several hundred people took to the streets in multiple cities, although incidents were limited. The authorities reported that around 300 demonstrators gathered in Paris, 600 in Lyon, and almost a thousand in Lille, where two arrests for damage and two police officers injured were reported. The proposed pension reforms, which will raise the legal retirement age to 64, have sparked public outrage and sparked a series of strikes and demonstrations across the country. The unions are preparing for their ninth day of strikes and mobilizations on Thursday.
Demonstration by railway workers in Lyon against the pension reform on March 22, 2023 (AFP / JEFF PACHOUD)
Emmanuel Macron is almost without regret. The highly contested pension reform must be applied “before the end of the year”, he said on Wednesday during a highly anticipated television intervention, assuming his “unpopularity” and immediately provoking ulcerated reactions.
In the evening, spontaneous wanderings of a few hundred people took place in several cities, like every evening for almost a week, but the incidents were limited.
According to the authorities, the demonstrators were 300 at the height of the evening in Paris, 600 in Lyon, nearly a thousand in Lille where a police source reported two arrests for damage and two police officers slightly injured.
In Lyon, street furniture was damaged and used to block traffic on the banks of the Rhône.
At midday, during a 35-minute television interview, the Head of State once again pleaded for a “necessary” reform that he does not lead “for pleasure”.
“I don’t live with regrets,” he said, conceding however that he “failed to convince of the need” for the reform, which plans to raise the legal retirement age to 64.
French President Emmanuel Macron during his television interview at the Elysée Palace in Paris on March 22, 2023 ( AFP / Ludovic MARIN )
The Head of State pinned the opposition by saying that for them, the project “is the deficit”. The presidential interview immediately made them jump, as well as the trade unions which are preparing for a 9th day of strikes and mobilizations on Thursday.
“The foutage of the mouth and contempt for the millions of people who demonstrate”, slammed the boss of the CGT Philippe Martinez. “Denial and lies”, fumed his CFDT counterpart Laurent Berger, when Emmanuel Macron had just said that no union had offered a compromise on pensions.
Mr. Macron, who on Tuesday dismissed any immediate prospect of reshuffle, dissolution or referendum, listed the arguments deployed by his camp since the activation of article 49.3 on this reform, adopted after the rejection, only nine votes close to a motion of censure against his government.
“If we have to endorse unpopularity today, I will endorse it,” assumed the head of state who returned to controversial remarks made the day before before the parliamentarians of his majority.
An opponent of the pension reform makes noise during the television interview with French President Emmanuel Macron broadcast in a street in Le Mans, March 22, 2023 ( AFP / JEAN-FRANCOIS MONIER )
While his reform sparks daily demonstrations in the country and strikes, he indicated that the “crowd” had “no legitimacy against the people who express themselves, sovereign, through their elected representatives”.
– “Logout” –
Remarks that targeted parliamentarians targeted by violence, he assured Wednesday. “We cannot accept either the rebels or the factions,” he insisted on Wednesday, citing the examples of the attacks on the Capitol in Washington by supporters of Donald Trump or the places of power in Brasilia by those of Jair Bolsonaro. .
Map of mobilizations against the pension reform planned for March 23, 2023 in France, according to the CGT (March 22 at 3:57 p.m.) ( AFP / )
Like the unions, political opponents reacted strongly to Mr. Macron’s remarks.
The president lavishes his “traditional marks of contempt”, protested Jean-Luc Mélenchon. “I fear that he has put no more explosives on an already well lit inferno,” denounced PS boss Olivier Faure.
On the right too, the criticism is harsh. The president of the Republicans (LR) Eric Ciotti castigated solutions “not up to the political and economic crisis we are experiencing”.
“He says he respects, but he insults. All French people, all the time,” said far-right leader Marine Le Pen.
After more than two months of protest, demonstrations and blocking actions have multiplied since 49.3 last Thursday.
In Strasbourg, Laurent, 53, an executive in a transport company and who had voted for Emmanuel Macron, has not yet demonstrated but will take to the streets on Thursday. “I’m not used to demonstrations at all, far from it” but “the way of doing things, the so-called debate which ends without taking any opinion into account, it’s brutal, it’s not acceptable”, declares the fifties, who did not want to give his name.
– “Co-construction” at the Assembly –
On Wednesday, the port of Marseille-Fos was totally blocked as part of a “dead ports” day at the call of the CGT, while punch actions were also carried out around the port area of Capécure, in Boulogne-sur-Mer (Pas-de-Calais).
The Puget-sur-Argens oil depot (Var) is blocked by demonstrators, as are two roundabouts serving two oil depots north of Bordeaux, while at the national level, 14.3% of service stations know a shortage of at least one type of fuel. More than a hundred people gathered in the evening in front of the TotalEnergies refinery in Normandy to oppose requisitions by strikers, according to the CGT.
For Thursday, the SNUipp-FSU, the first union in primary education, has planned between 40 and 50% of primary school teachers on strike.
The situation should be very disrupted in transport, in particular trains – half of the TGVs will run – and around 30% of flights will be canceled from Paris-Orly.
Map showing the situation of refineries on the territory of metropolitan France, March 22, 2023 at 4:00 p.m. ( AFP / )
Paris metro and RER traffic will be “very disrupted”. The strike, renewable at the RATP, will be followed more than in recent days, but less than at the very beginning of the movement in January.
Eager to get out of this retreat sequence, the president tried to give perspectives. Charges Elisabeth Borne with “building a government program” likely to “expand” the relative majority in the Assembly, in a process of “co-construction of a parliamentary agenda with all the forces of the two chambers”.
“The compromise works”, “we are capable of it”, assured the Prime Minister before the Senate.
Railway staff demonstrate against pension reform in Lyon, March 22, 2023 (AFP / JEFF PACHOUD)
First precaution, however: the immigration bill, presented as the next victim of opposition to the Assembly, will be split into “several texts” in “the coming weeks”.
Mr. Macron also wants to “re-engage” a dialogue with the social partners on the relationship to work. But “we have to wait a few days, a few weeks,” he observed.
Immediate response from Laurent Berger: “These are empty words, for the moment, there is a big social conflict, a democratic crisis, a social crisis. You have to be crazy (…), there is a delay of decency “, he told AFP.
As tensions continue to rise in France over the controversial pension reform, President Emmanuel Macron remains steadfast in his commitment to see it through. In a television interview on Wednesday, he acknowledged his unpopularity and the difficulty in convincing people of the need for the reform, but reiterated that it must be applied before the end of the year. Despite a week of nightly demonstrations and sporadic incidents of violence, the government reports limited damage and arrests. Unions, however, are preparing for a ninth day of strikes and mobilizations on Thursday. With no immediate solution in sight, the country remains divided, uncertain, and increasingly frustrated.