Macron, with his usual arrogance, has encouraged workers to find again the “meaning of effort” and to be “engaged at work”. It is notorious that cleaning ladies, nursing assistants, workers – all the people who have been mobilised for two months because they are fed up with working for peanuts – are all sitting back and chilling. Last Saturday, the “lazy people” in yellow jackets answered Macron in the best of ways: by demonstrating in large numbers all over the country.
Yellow is doing well
Government leaders are starting to get scared: they keep trying to find ways to stop the movement, but no luck. The mobilisation has regained strength and is still supported by a majority of people. Even the government’s bet to scare demonstrators with the announcement of repressive measures – just when examples of police brutality multiply – has failed. Last Saturday, Lille, Marseille, Bordeaux et many other cities, saw their largest demonstrations since the movement started. Everywhere the anger and determination of the yellow jackets was on display. They want to end the hard time of the people who work hard but can’t make ends meet, and end the contempt toward those who produces everything but are never listened to.
The big national nonsense debate
Happily switching from the stick to the carrot, Macron wrote a long letter to start the “big national debate”. Has the government suddenly taken the new resolution to listen to our anger?
You just have to scratch the surface a bit to see that it’s all smoke and mirror. In his letter, Macron states that he will keep following his program and will not go back on the policy already enacted since he took office. Benjamin Griveaux, the government spokesman, has already declared that the tax on wealth would never be reinstated. So there is no actual debate: this looks more like a soccer game where the referee belongs to one of the teams and the final score is known before the game started! And it smells bad, with “immigration quotas” being one of the “authorised” discussion points. After having slandered the yellow jackets, Macron now makes a friendly gesture toward the far right, even though many yellow jackets have shown solidarity with the migrants, and immigration has practically dropped out of the yellow jackets concerns.
The government uses any means to buy time, hoping the movement will wind down. But the yellow jackets have just shown that they do not want to oblige…
He wants to screw us one way or the other
Macron is running a true economic blackmail: any tax cut will have to be compensated by a cut in public services. While the yellow jackets protest against the worsening of our living standards, Macron proposes to discuss whether it should be access to education or to health that will be scrapped. But the bigger swindle, the less likely it is to work!
There is plenty of money around, but you have to be willing to look in the right places. In 2018, companies listed in the CAC40 gave their stockholders €57 billion, a record amount of dividends in the last ten years.
Welcome to the yellow fever
The yellow jackets continue to express an anger felt by the whole working class, about how difficult it is to make ends meet and the worsening of working conditions. In many companies, yearly wage bargaining is about to start. Everywhere, those wages are stuck at rock bottom, while stockholders are stuffing themselves. All together, we have the strength to force the government and the bosses to back down. The yellow jackets are showing the way, by counting only on themselves and not letting themselves be intimidated. It is in our interest to join this fight, in the streets and in our workplaces, starting with next Saturday’s demonstrations.
