Why Are French Protests Continuing Tomorrow
Numbers Diminish at Protests in France
MARSEILLE, France — Several hundred thousand people demonstrated again on Thursday to protest changes in France's retirement age, but the numbers were down significantly from previous national days of protest, and it appeared that President Nicolas Sarkozy and his government had won an important victory.
Mr. Sarkozy's approval ratings are hovering around 30 percent, a historic low, but loyalists say he will now be able to contrast his firmness in carrying through a historic reform with the behavior of previous governments that backed down in the face of the "democracy of the streets."
In Marseille, where the strikes are thought to have had the greatest impact on day-to-day life, the streets and sidewalks are full of garbage, and the port remains blocked. Residents are a little exasperated that it is not clear when things might return to normal. In an uncharacteristic show of bipartisanship, local leaders from Mr. Sarkozy's ruling party have been joined in recent days by opposition Socialists in calling for an end to the strikes.
France's unions had called for the day of strikes, even though the lower house of Parliament gave final approval on Wednesday to increase the minimum retirement age to 62 from 60 and the age to receive a full pension to 67 from 65. If the bill is approved, as expected, by the Constitutional Council, it should become law in mid-November and begin to take effect next July.
Estimates of participation in Thursday's protests varied widely, here and throughout the country. In Marseille, the police said 12,000 people turned out, while union leaders put the number at 150,000. In Paris, the police said that 31,000 people demonstrated, down from 67,000 on Oct. 19; the nation's largest union, the C.G.T., said 170,000, down from 330,000.
Nationally, the police put the figure at 560,000, the weakest figure yet and about half that in October; the C.G.T. said 2 million, down from 3.5 million last time.
Union leaders said they would keep fighting. Bernard Thibault, the leader of the C.G.T., said: "Contrary to what the government thinks, the adoption of this reform is not bringing us any closer to the end of the conflict. And we'll continue, tomorrow, as on Nov. 6, the date of another day of action, to ask for the nonapplication of the law. Adopted or not, the affair's not over."
But he also conceded, in an interview with Libération, that "the way we contest it is shifting."
Air and rail traffic were disrupted on Thursday; news agencies reported that nearly half of the flights at Orly Airport near Paris were grounded, with around a third of flights at Charles de Gaulle and other airports canceled. As usual on strike days, most intercontinental flights took off as scheduled.
The national railroad system said on its Web site that up to 80 percent of high-speed inter-city trains would run normally, but the proportion for slower and local trains was lower. In Paris, subway and bus services operated almost normally.
The situation was tougher in Marseille, which has always been a union town. Since the end of World War II, the city's dock and port workers and trash collectors have protested and struck with great regularity, and gained a great deal of local influence. The trash collectors alone have gone on strike about 20 times in the past three decades.
For the last month, strikers have been blocking two major oil depots. Thousands of trash collectors returned to work on Tuesday after two weeks on strike, but the cleanup is expected to last days and cost almost $700,000.
"It's deplorable to give an image of such strong fanaticism," Jean-Claude Gaudin, the city's mayor and a prominent member of Mr. Sarkozy's party, told France Info radio. "The unions completely blocked the city."
In the narrow Rue du Tapis Vert, local businesspeople were not happy. Mounds of bulging bags of putrid trash, old sofa cushions, cardboard boxes and bottles of all sizes and varieties were still waist high on the street.
"You never get used to this system — it's completely illogical," said Laura Atlan, 22, marking packages in her mother's wholesale clothing company, Basic & Cie. The store has been offering protective masks to clients, for the smell.
The trash pile in front of the store was recently set on fire, charring part of the storefront and destroying the sign above the entrance.
"It's a pure and simple catastrophe," said Ms. Atlan's mother, Monique Amsellem, 46. She said the trash collectors "shouldn't count on end-of-year tips this year." Instead, she said, she might offer them an envelope stuffed with trash.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/29/world/europe/29france.html
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