On the occasion of International Workers’ Day, 116,000 people paraded everywhere in France, according to the Ministry of the Interior, 210,000 according to the CGT.
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The left has become so habit of defeats, in the street as in the ballot boxes, that the good score of the candidate of Insoumise France (LFI), Jean-Luc Mélenchon, in the first round of the presidential election ( Third place, 21.95 %) gave it a form of hope. In any case, among its most unionized, the most politicized activists, those who participated in the parades of the May 1 by claiming another social policy, resources for public services, the refusal of a retirement at 65 years or salary increases for workers.
The crowd was not exceptional, Sunday, in the streets of Paris, Strasbourg, Marseille, Toulouse, Bordeaux, where 116,000 people paraded, according to the Ministry of the Interior, 210,000 according to the CGT, in a Quite festive atmosphere, even if several hundred thugs, in Paris, degraded furniture, shops and violently attacked the police and gendarmes. As much as the figures -slightly higher than in May 2021, but lower than those of 2019, the last movement before the pandemic of Covid -19 -, it is the words, the slogans, which express the feeling of this left, hard core of the Mélenchon electorate, to have regained confidence in its ability to weigh on public debate.
Sina Krishnan, for example, red vest of the CGT on the shoulders, in the Parisian parade. The militant, 60, accustomed to the parades of 1 er -Mai for decades, rejoices: “There are more young people than usual!”. Employed by a car rental company at Roissy airport, he worries about what he considers to be a sustainable human rights movement. Both on wages as on pensions. “It does not date from Macron, already under François Hollande and still before.” He slipped a Mélenchon bulletin in the first round of the presidential election, as in 2017, before voting white in the second so as not to have to choose between outgoing president and the far right candidate. “I will never vote for the RN [national rally]. But I have been parading against Macron for five years. It would not have made sense to vote for him.” For the legislative elections, he will vote for a candidate supported by Mélenchon: “I have always had left values, you have to wear and defend them.”
The political calendar, which places the annual union ritual between the presidential election (April 10 and 24) and the legislative elections (June 12 and 19), obviously gave a particular tone to this day. Especially for the voters of Jean-Luc Mélenchon who had often decided in pain to vote for Emmanuel Macron in the second round in order to oppose the extreme right. This is the case of Emma, 21, student in English license in Paris, voter of the candidate of La République en Marche in the second round “to block Marine Le Pen”. “Today, I am here to signify Emmanuel Macron that, despite my vote, I am opposed to all his measures.” The young woman notably evokes the reform of the university: “I do not want my children to be forced to pay thousands of euros to be able to study higher. “
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