For the 10th time under the Fifth Republic, this Monday, France will observe a day of national mourning. A day decreed by Emmanuel Macron to pay tribute to the victims of Cyclone Chido which devastated the Mayotte archipelago, on December 14, 2024.
“We are a Nation. We all share the pain of the Mahorais. I will declare national mourning for this Monday, December 23,” Emmanuel Macron indicated in a message posted on X (formerly Twitter) on Thursday. On this occasion, the flags will be flown at half-mast and the French are “invited to worship at 11 a.m.,” he said.
“There will be a minute of silence in all public services and we will invite the population” to observe it, he added during an exchange with the press in the evening.
“One or more days” of national mourning
But what is this event really about? National mourning “is not a ceremony, unlike national tribute and national funerals,” explains the Vie publique website. It is a moment of contemplation decided by the President of the Republic, who signs a decree to make it official. National mourning can be declared for “one or more days”.
On the other hand, it is the Prime Minister who is responsible for setting the terms of mourning. If there are “few legal provisions on how these days should be held”, the half-masting of flags on public buildings and edifices is automatic. The Prime Minister can also request the organization of a minute of silence, specifies the site.
A tribute to the former presidents of the Republic
Under the Fifth Republic, this is only the 10th time that national mourning has been decreed, recalls the Public Life website. It was notably decided upon the disappearance of former Presidents of the Republic, such as November 12, 1970 for Charles de Gaulle, January 11, 1996 for François Mitterrand, September 30, 2019 for Jacques Chirac and December 9, 2020 for Valéry Giscard d’Estaing. This was also the last time national mourning was declared.
When a President of the Republic dies in the exercise of his functions, it is up to the President of the Senate, who serves in the interim, to declare national mourning. This was the case in 1974, after the death of President Georges Pompidou. Upon the death of a President of the Republic, the flags and standards of the armies are flown at half-mast for the entire duration of national mourning, set by the Prime Minister, according to the decree of September 13, 1989.
Honoring the Victims of Terrorism
Since the beginning of the Fifth Republic, the decree of national mourning has also been issued four times to pay tribute to the victims of terrorist attacks: on September 14, 2001, three days after the September 11 attacks in the United States, two times in 2015, after the attack on Charlie Hebdo and the November 13 attacks, and in 2016, after the July 14 attack in Nice.
The national mourning declared in 2001, after the September 11 attacks, is the only one to have been organized to pay tribute to people killed outside France, underlines the Public Life site. If national mourning is in the majority of cases declared for one day, it lasted three days on two occasions, after the attacks of November 13 and that of July 14.
This Monday, December 23, will, however, be the first time that a day of national mourning has been declared for victims of climate disaster under the Fifth Republic. But before that, it had already been organized in 1930 after the floods which left around a hundred dead in the south of France.
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