Strikers were waiting for the former prime minister at the headquarters of the Paris transport authority on Monday.
If the day of his official appointment, Jean Castex had declared to be “fully aware of the challenges ahead for this public companyhe surely didn’t expect to face it so quickly. Not yet seated at his desk, the new CEO of RATP has already had to manage a first mobilization: more than a hundred staff members – “at least 400“, According to the strikers – had met around 11 am at the headquarters of the public company on Monday.
On several videos shot at the end of the morning, a predominantly male audience enters the group’s headquarters, chanting “let him go down“, to the address of the former Prime Minister. “We’ll go get it!shout other strikers in response. Not far away, some are brandishing smoke bombs.
According to AFP, a small delegation was received by Sylvie Buglioni, director of MRF (railway rolling stock), as well as a representative of the group’s human relations. But the interview was cut short when employees entered the meeting. Later, management representatives promised that they would be received by Jean Castex “in the coming weeks“and that wage demands would be discussed”as part of year-end negotiations“. The demonstrators are indeed demanding an increase in their salary of approximately “300 euro“, a figure that was chanted during the mobilization.
First hectic steps for the new CEO who risks setting the tone for a busy mandate. Internal tensions, lagging recruitment, fraudulent work stoppages, “absenteeism», Opening up to competition, ecological transition… The challenges are not lacking for the former Prime Minister. He, however, refused to fall.in RATP bashing“: “I have the intimate conviction that the RATP is of sizeto overcome the challenges ahead, he said when he was appointed.
Read alsoJean Castex officially appointed CEO of RATP
She herself had not been easy. In mid-October, the High Authority for Transparency in Public Life (HATVP) gave the green light to this appointment, while expressing reservations. In particular, the new CEO will not be able to come into contact, for three years, with “members of the Government in office who were also members when he was Prime Minister “.