They want to believe it: this time will be ” the maid “. Because they have “enough of police violence”, “enough of cheap schools”of the “precarious jobs”of the “rotten housing” and “humiliation”, ” enough “ not to count in the eyes of political leaders, men and women from working-class neighborhoods, historic association leaders or newcomers to the world of community activism. “cursed cities”they write in their presentation text, are embarking on yet another attempt at coordination.
The objective? Organize, unite, train new generations in political combat in order to have influence in the public debate. The initiative, officially launched on April 27 in Paris, has a name: the Neighborhood Assembly.
This project has been in the pipeline for two years. “This is the time it took to accept that we were not all in agreement, that we will never be in agreement on certain subjects, that our priorities are not the same for everyone, but that we are aware that if we want to have influence, we must come together”explains Youcef Brakni, one of the first signatories of the Neighborhood Assembly and member of the Truth and Justice Committee for Adama, named after Adama Traoré, a 24-year-old young man who died in July 2016, in Val-d’ Oise, following an arrest by gendarmes. “Exist collectively, get involved politically!” »this is the credo of this new movement, who wants to be “a sort of neighborhood union”continues Mr. Brakni.
Solidarity and power
In the first edition of the newspaper distributed on the occasion of the launch of the movement, its founders – a hard core of around fifty people, most aged between 40 and 60 – denounce the way certain political parties and media “exploit spaces of social and racial segregation in working-class neighborhoods” and make their young people “stigmatized outcasts”. “Today, we no longer have a choice, our backs are against the wall. Either we take control of the neighborhood narrative in the face of fascistic discourse and authoritarian excesses, or we give way to the far right”says Magda Jouini, 42, administrator of the Front de Mères, a parents’ union which fights against discrimination and violence, very active in Seine-Saint-Denis.
The Neighborhood Assembly has set itself three missions: transmit the history of social struggles and train new generations of activists; take political power by supporting and supporting autonomous lists in the 2026 municipal elections; and exercise full solidarity between neighborhood stakeholders, by supporting local initiatives.
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