PARIS – French union activists marched on the Paris Olympics headquarters and halted traffic at the capital’s Orly Airport on Tuesday, hoping to rekindle opposition to a higher retirement age.
However, the last-ditch effort gathered fewer supporters than the movement’s peak earlier this year, and even some union officials were ready to go on.
President Emmanuel Macron’s decision to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64 — and drive the legislation through parliament without a vote — infuriated the public and sparked some of France’s worst protests in years.
However, the intensity of opposition to the pension reform has waned since the last major rallies on May 1, which drew over 500,000 people in Paris alone, and after the bill became law in April.
As a result of Tuesday’s protests, one-third of flights at Paris’ Orly Airport were canceled, while roughly 10% of trains in France were impacted. Around 250 marches, demonstrations, and other events were planned across the country to celebrate the 14th day of nationwide protest against the pension change since January.
A small number of activists from the hard-left CGT union stormed the 2024 Olympic headquarters in the Paris neighborhood of Saint-Denis, yelling anti-Macron slogans.
Mild tensions erupted at a restaurant on Paris’s Left Bank as people vandalized bus shelters and tossed objects at police. The crowds were immediately dispersed by police.
Thousands gathered along the Seine River embankments near the gold-domed Invalides monument before marching to southeast Paris. The peaceful throng chanted, waved union flags, banged drums, and demanded the repeal of the pension reform and a lower retirement age.
According to local public radio France Bleu, union activists marched on railway tracks in Rennes before being forced back by police.
Macron claims that the pension reform is necessary to fund the pension system as the population ages. Unions and left-wing opponents claim that the reforms are unfair to low-wage workers and advocate for more taxes on the affluent and companies instead.
Laurent Berger, the departing president of the moderate CFDT union, stated that following Tuesday’s events, “we will continue to contest the retirement reform, but it will take on a different form.”
Other rallies are ”possible,” according to CGT president Sophie Binet, who also said it was time to talk about other issues such as working conditions or corporate tax evasion.
Organizers of Tuesday’s protests hope to garner support before a possible parliamentary discussion on a measure to repeal the new retirement age on Thursday.
The bill to raise the retirement age to 62 was sponsored by lawmakers from the moderate opposition group LIOT. However, it has already encountered obstacles before reaching the parliamentary floor. While Macron’s centrist party lacks a majority in the National Assembly, it has joined forces with the conservative Republicans to counter the opposition’s efforts.
Source: AP