Demonstrations against the far right brought together more than a thousand people this Saturday in Nîmes and around five hundred in Alès.
In Nimes
After that of Tuesday, initiated by the Communist Party, which brought together around 500 people, another demonstration against the extreme right took place this Saturday morning in Nîmes. At the initiative of the inter-union union, it brought together double the number of people, more than a thousand, who came to oppose the prospect of seeing the far right in power within two weeks.
Activists gathered on Boulevard Victor Hugo • Photo Corentin Corger
In order to spare the demonstrators the same speech, only one speech took place before leaving. “We need a democratic and social revival. Otherwise, the extreme right will come to power. We have seen it at work in history and today in Italy or Argentina for example: austerity for salaries and public services, constitutional reforms calling into question the independence of the judiciary and the role of unions, attacks against the rights of women and LGBTQIA+ people, calling into question the right to abortion, racist policies which put workers in opposition and workers based on their religion, color or nationality”declared the representative of Solidaires, chosen by lot to speak.
Vincent Bouget, Pierre Jaumain, Nicolas Nadal… the local figures of the Left were present but not Nicolas Cadène who stole Béatrice Leccia’s place at the last moment to run in the 6th constituency. Gathered in front of the Carré d’Art, the procession headed towards Boulevard Victor-Hugo to go to the prefecture. It was made up of more than 1,000 people, according to police. “Popular front, popular front!”could we hear from the activists.
In Ales
At the end of last week, at the initiative of young communists and young rebels, supported by the unions and various left-wing parties, a rally took place on the square in front of Cratère in the Gard sub-prefecture. Nevertheless, the mobilization took on a greater scale during the rally this Saturday, June 15 at 10 a.m. According to the CGT, more than 500 people, representing various left-wing movements, were present. Among the unions were the CGT, the SNUipp FSU, Solidaires, the Confédération paysanne and the CFDT. The left-wing parties were also represented, notably the Socialist Party by Christiane Thomas, La France Insoumise, and the French Communist Party with Giovanni di Francesco but also Pierre Thomas, 17 years old, departmental secretary of the young communists in Gard. United under the banner of the “Cévennes Popular Front”, they not only warned against “the dangers of the extreme right in power” but above all took advantage of the moment to present the political program of this joint candidacy.
There were many different flags during this morning’s demonstration in Alès. • Photo Louis Valat
The two candidates for the constituencies of Alès and Cévennes, Michel Sala (5th constituency) and Arnaud Bord (4th constituency), spoke. The first named said he was proud of this mobilization: “The moment we are experiencing is historic”insisted Michel Sala, before continuing “Historic because all the political organizations came together in a very broad way and we must take this into account and respect this unity established. But we succeed because there are also the trade union organizations and I thank them for that. There are also associations today which have woken up to say no and stop to the National Rally and Macron’s policies.”
Arnaud Bord, for his part, underlined: “The advent of the RN is not inevitable, we are here, we are standing. We are speaking to those who have lost confidence in democracy. Let’s talk about the daily reality, the real challenges. People are hungry , they aspire to more humanity in our society. Let’s make these two weeks a commitment to people in need.”
