Thousands of opponents of the immigration law gathered this Sunday, January 14 in several cities in France to demand its “total withdrawal” and maintain the “pressure” before the decision of the Constitutional Council on January 25.
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“The Macron laws, the Darmanin laws, we don’t want them.” There were several thousand demonstrators – 25,000, according to the organizers – marching in Paris, in the cold and to the sound of percussion. At the head of the procession, many undocumented immigrants, whose hopes of regularization in stressed sectors have been dashed.
“ We demand the pure and simple withdrawal of the Darmanin law. This law is against us, immigrants, even those with French nationality. Because if we misstep, we can be sent back to our home country and start from scratch », denounces Mariama Sidibé, spokesperson for the collective of undocumented immigrants from Paris, a former retired home help. “ It is a racist law, designed to keep us precarious and criminalize us, this mobilization is only the beginning », Adds Aboubacar Dembélé, from the collective of undocumented workers of Vitry-sur-Seine (Val-de-Marne), while other gatherings are planned for next Sunday.
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More than 400 collectives, associations, unions and political parties called for demonstrations against a text which “ takes up many ideas from the far right “. Adopted forceps by Parliament on December 19the text restricts the payment of social benefits for foreigners, establishes migration quotas, calls into question the automaticity of land law and reestablishes a “ crime of illegal residence “. It also provides for the forfeiture of nationality for dual nationals convicted of intentional homicide against any person holding public authority.
A ” pure and simple withdrawal »
“ We expect nothing from the decision of the Constitutional Council. He will undoubtedly remove certain items, but we are asking for total withdrawal. », Recalls Denis Godard, a leader of the Solidarity March. The head of the La France insoumise deputies, Mathilde Panot, present in Paris, abounds in demanding the “ pure and simple withdrawal of the immigration law which disfigures the republican identity of France “.
It is the same message that the opponents took up everywhere in France, as in Lyon where there were between 2,300 people (prefecture) and 3,000 (organizers). In Bordeaux, there were 2,000 to 3,000 people, according to AFP journalists. Elsewhere, the police counted 1,600 demonstrators in Rennes, 500 in Strasbourg, where a leading banner demanded “ regularization of all undocumented immigrants “.
Before the decision of the Sages of January 25, a new appeal against the law was launched by more than 200 personalities, for January 21. Actors, writers, journalists, trade unionists including the leaders of the CFDT Marylise Léon and the CGT Sophie Binet, are calling to take to the streets against a law “ written under the dictation of hate mongers who dream of imposing their project of “national preference” on France “. “ In this law, there are legal problems because it is in complete rupture with the principles which founded our Republic », Underlined Sophie Binet on RTL.
(With AFP)