The president of the LR group of deputies Olivier Marleix (left) and the president of the LR party Éric Ciotti (right), at the National Assembly, in Paris, on February 14, 2023. Ludovic MARIN / AFP
The signatories point to the fact that the demonstration which took place in Sainte-Soline on Saturday March 25 had been banned by the Prefecture.
The LR deputies wrote on Tuesday March 28 to the President of the National Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet to ask her for disciplinary sanctions against their left-wing colleagues present on Saturday at the demonstration in Sainte-Soline marked by clashes.
“The irresponsibility shown by some of our fellow MEPs is all the more appalling given the banning of this demonstration“, Explain the 43 signatories which include the president of LR Éric Ciotti, that of the parliamentary group Olivier Marleix and the deputy Julien Dive who posted the letter on Twitter.
These facts are not worthy and respectful of their function.
LR signatories
Without naming them, they ask fordisciplinary sanctions against elected officials who engage in demonstrations disturbing order” because “these facts are not worthy and respectful of their function and of all French people“. Elected officials LFI and EELV were present at this demonstration organized on Saturday in Sainte-Soline (Deux-Sèvres) against “mega-basins», and punctuated by violence which injured several people and left two participants between life and death.
The LR signatories also deplore that farmers “also suffer these clashes” in particular by a “violation of their private property“. They recall thatrecently and for the first time, a deputy was sanctioned because of a triggering event outside the Assembly“, in allusion to the exclusion for fifteen days of the LFI Thomas Portes for a photo where he posed, the foot on a ball with the effigy of the Minister of Labor Olivier Dussopt.
Read alsoViolence in Sainte-Soline: could the chaos have been avoided?
“No power to sanction”
“There is therefore no reason why disciplinary sanctions should not apply in these specific cases.“, add the deputies. Yaël Braun-Pivet has already argued on Sunday that “as President of the National Assembly“she didn’t have”no power to sanction parliamentarians concerning the actions they may have outside the National Assembly and outside the Chamber, and that is quite normal“.
Regarding the case of deputy Portes, the offending tweet had had “an impact within the Assembly » : the whole hemicycle had been scandalized by this photo and the deputies as a whole refused to continue deliberating as long as “Thomas Portes did not apologize“, she recalled on RTL / LCI /Le Figaro. For their part, the Insoumis are asking for a parliamentary commission of inquiry into the choices for maintaining order in Sainte-Soline. But they have already used their unique drawing right, which would de facto launch such a commission, and want the Assembly to take up the subject.