Emmanuel Macron is not the only one to see his travels heckled by opponents of pension reform. Several ministers have been received freshly by welcome committees and casseroles in recent days or have been forced to give up field visits.
A dozen CGT activists questioned the Minister of Industry Roland Lescure on the pension reform Thursday morning, traveling to Garges-les-Gonesse (Val-d’Oise). In front of the Colette Besson gymnasium, guarded by CRS, the minister exchanged with a CGT activist from the RATP for several minutes, noted an AFP journalist. The Minister of Sports Amélie Oudéa-Castéra went through another entry for this trip dedicated to inclusion in sport.
Concert of saucepans
Traveling to Agen on Wednesday evening, the Minister of Digital Jean-Noël Barrot was greeted by dozens of people with saucepans and by a long power cut in a brasserie where he was to lead a conference, noted a correspondent from the AFP. Same concert of saucepans for Christophe Béchu (Ecology) on Wednesday in Sarthe, where around twenty demonstrators unfurled a banner “The government is stubborn, so are we”, told the regional daily West France.
The Attac association also calls “not to let go of Macron and his ministers and to join the non-reception committees everywhere in France” and offers a map on its site to follow the movements of the ministers. Other members of the government have recently postponed trips, even if they do not always put forward the motive of security and the movement of pensions to explain them.
“Cascade Cancellations”
Thursday in Dijon, a conference on the end of life in which the Minister Delegate Agnès Firmin-Le Bodo (health professions) was to participate was canceled. A decision taken “following serious and proven threats of union origin”, confirmed to the BFM site the Renaissance deputy Didier Martin, at the initiative of the evening. Eric Dupond-Moretti postponed his planned trip to Valence on Thursday “for a few weeks” because of the “judicial vacation” and not at all because of the day of protest of the CGT-railway workers, explained the entourage of the Minister of Justice.
This does not prevent the boss of the LFI deputies Mathilde Panot from rejoicing on Twitter at these “cascading cancellations”: “The reception committees are forming as quickly as the President has promulgated his infamous reform”. “We were told to get in touch with the prefectures and see directly with them”, explained to AFP a ministerial source about the security of these trips, recalling the instructions given by Matignon since the start of the crisis. retreats.