Acoustic guitar, horse show, house cocktails and regional stands. It’s a party in Beaucaire, where the National Rally is returning. Near the refreshment bar, suddenly, people listen. Background music denotes. In the speakers resonates a revisited version of “Bella ciao”, the song of the Italian resistance fighters. Outraged reaction from a frontist: “An antifa chant at an RN event? What the hell is that doing there?” It’s a day of celebration but let’s not exaggerate.
The city’s arena and its concrete esplanade were privatized for the occasion. This year, the deputies play veterans, kiss each other, visit the stands in their region. The most media-oriented, like Laure Lavalette, elected official from Var, treat themselves to selfie tours, rock star smiles on request. The far right is in a good mood. Guzzled by the recent polls, the frontists are repeating Jordan Bardella’s favorite formula: “We are at the gates of power.” In Beaucaire, not everyone shares this enthusiasm. On the Place de la République, a small group of activists gathered to protest against the presence of the RN and to complain about the management of Julien Sanchez, RN mayor of the city. Geneviève denounces an “ambient racism felt on a daily basis”. “The town hall prohibits its employees from speaking in Spanish to Hispanic nationals, who are numerous in the city,” she assures.
Late in the afternoon, the arena fills up. Magnets, t-shirts, caps. The RN plays the Tour de France caravan and distributes goodies marked “Can’t wait for June 9”, the date of the European elections. The head of the frontist list is just taking the stage. “Jordan, I love you!” A slightly too enthusiastic activist disrupts the first minutes of the speech. Jordan Bardella, his cheeks red, a little unsettled, pulls himself together. Enough in any case to defend the idea of “France at home in its identity and in its borders”. To the applause of the public, he denounces the European policy “which decides to impose the distribution of migrants in our cities and our villages”, and points out the “demographic challenge” that the country would face, citing the island of Lampedusa , where several thousand people from North Africa have landed in recent days.
Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen, RN version
In front of the arena, the duo of singers continue their concert and hum through the gate a tune intended for the team of Daily, which the RN still refuses to accredit to its events. Inside, we are waiting for Marine Le Pen. The frontist boss promised journalists a surprise statement. This is, in fact, a new kind of statement. This is written, and is entitled “Declaration of the Rights of Peoples and Nations”. A sort of Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, version 2.0, which would not be intended to replace this one, but would intend to “complete international rules”. In the written text, 16 articles: a lot of concepts, a little vagueness, little concrete. Among them, the right to “identity”, to “inalienable natural rights”, to “national independence”, to “respect for national particularities”.
Faced with her supporters, Marine Le Pen provides some details. “It is about defending the dignity and equality of nations in law, going against the hegemonic desires of a few great state or supranational powers, of which of course the European Union is an incarnation.” A sovereignist epiphany, all in all, for the member of Parliament for Pas-de-Calais, who has not forgotten her identity counterpart. “Through this text, we wish to defend the right of nations to defend their identity, that is to say the right of peoples to historical continuity and the defense of their material and intangible heritage.”
The text will be the subject, assures Marine Le Pen, of a constitutional bill proposal and should be presented to the European and non-European allies of the far-right party, starting with the Lega of Matteo Salvini, to whom Marine Le Pen this Sunday. On the political adversary side, we cast a mocking eye on this new proposal. “It’s quite hollow, we’re sticking to the major principles of international law that already exist, tinged with sovereignism. We don’t really see what the concrete legal effects would be. It’s a posthumous victory for Philippotism,” quips a former ally . In Beaucaire, the meeting ends with applause. Marine Le Pen, coming down from the stage, even tries her hand at a cover of Dalida. “Let me dance, sing freely,” she sings. The musicians have already packed up.