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THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE have demonstrated in central Paris amid a heavy police presence to protest against President Emmanuel Macron’s sweeping reforms, a year after he came to office.
Some 2,000 security forces including riot police were deployed as marchers gathered from midday in warm early summer sunshine in the central Opera square for a protest dubbed a “Party for Macron”, a tongue-in-cheek “celebration” of the 40-year-old centrist’s first anniversary in power.
Smaller rallies took place in the southern cities of Toulouse and Bordeaux while the Paris variant kicked off with a mass picnic which drew numerous families.
Organisers had urged participants to attend in a party mood – but the high security owed much to hundreds of black-clad youths having torched cars and a McDonald’s restaurant during traditional 1 May demonstrations in the capital, prompting fears that more “black bloc” protesters could hijack today’s event.
One protester held aloft a placard with the words ‘Mac-ron is disgusting’, a play on words to show his feelings about the president and the fast food chain.
Organisers insisted the march from Opera to the Bastille area, east of the city centre, would be “joyful and festive”.
‘Worried about violence’
But government spokesman Benjamin Griveaux had expressed fears yesterday that the demonstration could turn violent.
He noted that the protest’s name, the “Fete a Macron”, can have a double meaning in French – either celebrating someone, or trying to do them harm.
“We are worried that there could be violence, and so we’re reinforcing security measures,” Griveaux said, adding the police role was to ensure peaceful demonstrations could go ahead.
Some supporters of the left-wing populist La France Insoumise party (LFI) brandished anti-Macron banners with slogans including “down with the president of the rich”, “no to a social coup d’etat”, and “for a Sixth Republic.”
The protest is the latest in a series of large street demonstrations against Macron, whose overhauls of everything from the education system to the state rail operator have been causing friction with various groups.
‘Democracy does not mean shutting up’
The demonstration was organised by firebrand LFI lawmaker Francois Ruffin and other ex-members of the Nuit Debout (Up All Night) leftist movement that staged nocturnal rallies across France in 2016.
Ruffin told AFP this week that Macron may have won a democratic election last May but “democracy does not mean shutting up for five years”.
“People have the right to challenge him,” said Ruffin, a journalist whose documentary “Merci Patron”, about a poor couple who take on France’s richest man, captured an angry zeitgeist and filled cinemas in 2015.
Numerous university faculties meanwhile remain blocked by protests against Macron’s plans to make university access more selective, causing major disruption to students starting their summer exams.
And yesterday marked the latest in a series of rail strikes as train drivers and other staff object to Macron’s overhaul of the SNCF, aimed at reducing its massive debts and making it more competitive.
Many French leftists have called for Macron’s opponents, from students to striking rail workers, to join forces in a re-run of the massive May 1968 protest movement that shook France exactly half a century ago.
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Rothschild banker skum
@neilo: you are always the one on here throwing remarks around and categorizing people. If someone writes a comment around a particular issue. You attack the person not the issue. Saying they are this it that without arguing in a constructive inoffensive way.
@neilo: definitely missing something alright. You comment, a lot.
My point is, You attack people with different viewpoints than you. And try to debase them imo.
Good ideas will always out do bad ones. No need to pigeon hole and try to ridicule people. That is all.
@neilo: pure drivel out of you. Go and find some non-internet people to set straight
@neilo: haha, what a fruitcake… imagine getting this worked up over some guy who calls himself “Lambo Moonski” on the Internet… LMFAO
@andyearley: I admire your constraint Andy. Anyone talking about illuminati is deluded and don’t realise the real conspiracy is there is no illuminati and they’re being had ……
@neilo: I got way more thumbs up than you, I win
@neilo: where Marcon come from? How does a 30 something year old banker have enough connections to become President of France. He is a fraud
Varadkar will be following him soon. It’s the same for Trudeau in Canada. All posers
Rothschilds puppet. Macron is no Frenchman.
@Otranto:
C’mon Otranto he passed his test in the Goldman Sachs school of investment banking which qualifies him several leagues ahead of most EU Parliament technocrats…
@Ron: He never worked at Goldman Sachs
@Charles Alexander: He can’t hear you through the tinfoil hat I’m afraid!
@PaulineSmith:
if any of you two would care to do some research you would realise that during his time at Rothschild & Cie Banque he managed the portfolio related to exclusively Goldman Sachs and it’s US operations in France but by all means say as you wish. By the the way my Milliner has not used tin since the early 80′s
@Ron: Surely you know the difference between managing a portfolio and actually working for the company which owns it? Maybe you don’t though. Conspiracy theorists love making connections about ‘shady elites’ and this was predicted back in mid-2017 when he got elected. The Rothschilds and anyone associated with them are easy targets for anti-Semitism. https://foreignpolicy.com/2017/05/18/emmanuel-macron-is-about-to-face-five-years-of-crazy-conspiracy-theories/
@Ron: I think your own research should be conducted with a little more care.
@Charles Alexander:
Indeed I will. Thank you.
@PaulineSmith:
So far you have mentioned
Tin foil hat
Conspiracy Theory
Anti Semite
My main argument was I don’t think millionaire investment bankers in their early forties have the skills to be elected leader a great nation like France.
Time will tell as his main allies in his cabinet slowly resign one by one.
@neilo:
A tad paranoid much?
A successful economy, which should mean jobs, education & equitable opportunities for all, is about striking a balance between public, private & labour union power sharing. In France it’s completely out of whack and the unions control of policy is damaging the entire country for years.
He has an impossible task and so will any new president there. France is also another country suffering from colonial karma – the influx of immigrants, a large number of which are refusing to work and cooperate with any system.
@Cashel Woods: Oh yeah it’s the unions of course, who crashed our economies with their reckless lending and criminal activities. If only we had a banker in charge especially a Rothschild’s banker all this could have been avoided.
@Cashel Woods: same with America, the only things on the up the economy and prices. Wages stagnating, poverty increasing etc
@Dave O Keeffe: i suppose the unions are to blame there as well…
Pity. I had high hopes for this guy but his attitude towards some people has been very bad.
You had to add in the Trump bit. Were you feeling withdrawals?
Varadkar and Macron. Spot the difference?
Difficult..
He has his faults but thank god he crushed Marine Le Pen in the elections, 66% to 34%, the French people are much smarter than their American brethern.
@PaulineSmith:
His faults are major, he is just another elite devoid of family values, he married his teacher ffs. He is no Frenchman.
@Otranto: Family values? Lol! Have fun in the 19th century!
@PaulineSmith: People who scoff at family values usually come from good families and don’t know how hard it is for people who have no safety net of a secure and close family.
@Otranto: you make a compelling argument.
@PaulineSmith: he’s her greatest hope though
@PaulineSmith: She’s why he got elected. If it weren’t for Le Pen, someone a lot more moderate would’ve got in. He was they least bad option.
@PaulineSmith: They seem to be regretting voting for this Poser .
Marie Antoinette was not the last queen of France. She was the last queen before the Revolution.
@Steven C. Schulz: after that they had empresses
Stick a H on his forehead and we have a bit of Red Dwarf going on. He’s already got the dwarf bit to a T..
@The Viking:
that is very accurate to be fair
What did you expect ? He represents the European corporation and money. He was elected only because extreme right party was opposed to him on second tour. But had in fact a low rate on first tour ( but yes more than the other candidates.)
You can vote for any candidate in a démocratie or any party. But bear in mind that private sector still in charge and do what best for them. People are only important because they have one right : vote. The rest is business as usual.
And it will be always like that, no matter how cool or logical it looks, the one deciding are not elected!
After welcoming Trump’s first state visit with him with the national marching band performing Daft Punk’s ‘Get Lucky’, I thought this lad could be sound … pity!
It’s a sad state of affairs when people can’t seem to put 2+2 together!
No mention of his marriage being a sham and being caught with his bodyguard and numerous others in previous occasions. Because that’s a big one for the straight laced French
Imagine talking down to a gardener telling him to become a waiter .maybe the gardener should have advised him to switch his job as well as he’s so out of touch with lives of working class .
@Bernadette Fitzpatrick: Its very reasonable advise. A job is a job. Not everyone can get the job they want. So what, if you can’t find your dream job, you just shouldn’t work at all and be supported by the taxpayer.
I know no French person who likes him. Most actively dislike him.
@David Stapleton: Same was true with Hollande and Sharkozy
@Damon16: true, but whereas Holland was basically seen as incompetent, and Sarkozy as a bit of a selfish little dictator, Macron is viewed with a more personal repugnance than either of them. At least from what I have seen.
surely not??? leo’s best friend??
Like Mark Twain, his demise is greatly exaggerated in this article. He needs time. Collomb wants to run for mayor of Lyon. Hulot is an ideologue who was never comfortable as a minister.
Hope he doesn’t go Full War Criminal like Tony Blair .
The Blair Clone had better watch out .
Civil war in Paris with fire and racism???
The world is lurching to the right. Brazil is just about to elect a hard-right nutter for president. Italy have voted in far-right populists. The British have lurched to the right since 2010. And far-right populists are gaining ground in many European nations. Of course, there is Trump who supports far-right organisations and media organisations. Trump calls any news outlet WITHOUT a right-wing agenda “FAKE” news. The new far-right Brazilian presidential candidate wants to pull Brazil out of the Paris Climate Accord, even though Cimate scientists say the world is heading for Climate catastrophe. No one seems to care about future generations, its all about jobs, security, and money.
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