Several demonstrations organized throughout France against the pension reform project brought together, this Saturday, February 11, between “more than 2.5 million” (CGT) and 963,000 people (Ministry of the Interior), a little more than last Tuesday (act three of the mobilization), especially in small and medium-sized towns. In Roanne, for example, the police had 6,000 demonstrators, against 3,000 on Tuesday. Same trend in Périgueux, where 5,200 people marched against 3,700 four days earlier. A rebound linked to the presence of a more family audience, with more parents accompanied by their children in the processions, observed Agence France Presse and BFMTV reporters.
In addition, for this first mobilization on a Saturday, the gap widened between the figures given by the authorities and those of the unions. In Clermont-Ferrand, the latter claimed 50,000 participants, against 8,000 according to the prefecture. In Toulouse, the CGT announced a record number of “more than 100,000 demonstrators”, the prefecture 25,000. The first three days of action brought together between 757,000 and 1.27 million people according to the authorities; between nearly two million and more than 2.5 million according to the inter-union.
In Paris, nearly 500,000 demonstrators according to the CGT, 93,000 according to the prefecture, marched between Place de la République and Place de la Nation, where minor clashes broke out. To control these crowds, 10,000 police and gendarmes were mobilized, including 4,500 in the capital.
Some incidents in the Parisian procession
In Paris, scuffles began shortly before 3:30 p.m. when a group tried to leave in a “wild procession” in the direction of rue de Charonne, thus deviating from the declared route, reported the police headquarters. After the intervention of the police, the clashes continued on Boulevard Voltaire, with fires from garbage cans and electric bicycles, glass containers overturned on the road and a car rolled onto its side and then set on fire, requiring the intervention of firefighters. Projectiles were also thrown at the police, who carried out several charges in return.
Previously, several attempts to damage the windows of banks, insurance companies and a fast food restaurant also required the intervention of the police.
Orly airport: unplanned strike by air traffic controllers
One in two flights departing from or arriving at Paris-Orly airport was canceled this Saturday afternoon, due to unplanned individual strikes by air traffic controllers, against the pension reform, while the unions did not call to stop work. “Given the observation of a certain number of strikers at the air navigation organization at Orly”, the General Directorate of Civil Aviation (DGAC) “asked the airlines to reduce their flight program by 50 % starting at 1 p.m. for the day,” the administration said in a statement.
The DGAC invited “passengers who can do so to postpone their trip and to inquire with their airline to find out the status of their flight”. The other major airport in the Paris region, Roissy-Charles-de-Gaulle, is not affected. Unlike the previous three days of mobilization against the pension reform, the administration had not implemented minimum service at Orly, which would have involved the preventive cancellation of part of the airline program, announced two days previously.
The Intersyndicale of the RATP calls for a renewable strike from March 7
The inter-union at the RATP called on Saturday for the first renewable strike of the movement at the Autonomous Paris Transport Authority from March 7. “If the government still does not hear the determination of the workers, the youth and all those who support this unitary movement to express their anger in the face of this new injustice, it will have to assume the blocking of the economy in our country”, warned the inter-union (CGT, FO, UNSA, CFE-CGC) in a press release.
Before the departure of the Paris procession at midday, the leaders of the eight main unions confirmed their call for a fifth act on Thursday February 16. They also said they were ready “to harden the movement” and to “put the country on hold on March 7” if the government and Parliament “remain (ai) ent deaf” to the mobilizations. This announcement “of a hardening on March 7, it leaves a little time if they want to react”, affirmed the number one of the CFDT, Laurent Berger, adding not to be “in the logic of a renewable strike”. His CGT counterpart, Philippe Martinez, stressed that “the ball (was) in the court” of the executive.
“Mr. Macron, if he is counting on usury, is in the wrong country”
From various processions across France, several political leaders have spoken. In Marseille, the former Insoumis deputy Jean-Luc Mélenchon declared: “Mr. Macron, if he is counting on usury, he is in the wrong country”. “Here it’s France and the people have a rebellious temperament,” he added. Deploring that the president and his government refuse to withdraw this bill, he considered that Emmanuel Macron’s way of acting is “an incitement to violence”. “He seems to tell people ‘when you do things quietly and normally, I don’t care’.”
At the start of the Paris demonstration, the former EELV presidential candidate, Yannick Jadot, encouraged the debate and the vote on article 7. “I call on everyone”, and “this must be the strategy of la Nupes”, to “ensure that article 7 on the postponement of the age to 64, which is the heart of absolute injustice, is debated and voted on in the Assembly”, he said. he assures.