Twelve activists, including MEP Pierre Larrouturou, announced in a press release on Thursday January 6 that they wanted to start a hunger strike from Friday. The collective intends to urge the left to nominate a common candidate for the presidential election, through the tie-breaking process proposed by the Popular Primary.
In addition to Mr. Larrouturou, who is a presidential candidate within the framework of the Popular Primary, and Anne Hessel, daughter of the diplomat and human rights defender Stéphane Hessel, appear in particular in the signatories of the press release the ecologist Pierre Monnier and seven activists who present themselves as “Young people of the climate generation”.
Elected MEP in 2019, Mr. Larrouturou had already led a hunger strike in 2020 to demand “A real tax on financial transactions”. In 2013, the founder of the Nouvelle Donne party also launched a four-day hunger strike in front of the National Assembly to alert elected officials to “The seriousness of the social and economic crisis”.
On the left, “divisions make any victory impossible”
“It is obvious to the entire scientific community that losing five years in the climate battle would be irrecoverable”, explain the twelve activists in their press release to justify their action. “Emmanuel Macron, not only has not undertaken anything effective in France to fight once morest climate change, but he is slowing down European action”, they estimate before considering that “Only the candidates of the left and the ecology are aware of the climate emergency and bring solutions up to the challenges”.
“But their divisions make any victory impossible”, then continue the militants, who consider that an alliance between the candidates declared on the left can still succeed before the ” mid February ” and play an important role in ending the presidential campaign. “It is not just a question of a failed election, but of the fate of our humanity”, they write. A press conference must be organized on Friday, January 7, in Paris, to launch their hunger strike.
Popular Primary is piloting a “Popular nomination”, namely a vote of some 300,000 signatories, scheduled for January 27 to 30, to nominate a candidate. Christiane Taubira, who « envisage » a candidacy, and the socialist candidate Anne Hidalgo mentioned it as a possible means of deciding between the five main candidates on the left. The ecologist Yannick Jadot, the “rebellious” Jean-Luc Mélenchon and the Communist Fabien Roussel have so far firmly ruled out getting involved.