Paris, 15 April 2023 (GNP): On Friday, France’s constitutional court approved Macron’s pension reform, permitting him to execute the controversial revisions that have provoked months of rallies and strikes.
The nine-member Constitutional Council declared that important elements of reform, notably hiking the retirement age from 62 to 64, were legal and approved them.
Six additional proposals were turned down, including one requiring major corporations to provide details about the number of individuals they employ over the age of 55 and another to establish a specific contract just for senior personnel.
With up to 10,000 people expected to gather again in Paris on Friday night, police are concerned that the recent protest’s destruction and fights would recur due to the presence of several hundred left-wing rebels.
The Constitutional Council has been guarded with barricades, and hundreds of riot police are stationed nearby to keep watch.
In addition to Lyon, where police deployed tear gas to disperse protesters, rallies with hundreds of participants also broke out in Marseille, Toulouse, and other towns.
Protesters in the western city of Rennes set fire to a police station’s entrance, and additional fires were also ignited there.
The court’s decision is seen as a success for Macron, but observers claim it has come at a significant personal cost to him while inflicting months of havoc on the nation with occasionally violent protests that have wounded hundreds.
The president’s popularity ratings are almost at an all-time low and many people were upset by his choice to disregard persistent public opinion and propel the pensions reform through the lower house of parliament without a vote.
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Macron said, “Stay the course, that’s my motto,” as he reviewed the reconstruction work at the Notre-Dame church on Friday.
The head of the CGT union, Sophie Binet, stated that “All the labor unions are calling on the President of the Republic to show some wisdom, listen and understand what is happening in the country and not to promulgate this law”.
“This was the only way to soothe the anger in the country”, all unions claimed in a joint statement.
Jean-Luc Melenchon, the head of the hard-left La France Insoumise party, tweeted that “The fight continues and must gather force”.
Unions urged Macron to put off signing the bill into law, which the former investment banker is scheduled to do in the following 48 hours.
Fabien Roussel, the head of the Communist Party, stated that signing the bill “would not be pouring oil on the fire, but a jerrycan full of petrol”. He warned, “I fear an outpouring of anger”.
In a second ruling on Friday, the court rejected a proposal by members of the opposition to call a vote on a different pension bill that would have fixed the retirement age at 62
The reform is opposed on the grounds that it discourages unskilled employees who began their careers early and threatens the right of French citizens to a prolonged retirement.
