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Macron signs France pension law despite protests

French President Emmanuel Macron signed his unpopular pension reform into law on Saturday, prompting accusations from unions and the left that he was showing "contempt" for those behind a three-month protest movement.

Published: 16 April 2023 11:21 CEST

Macron signs France pension law despite protests

A protestor holding a placard reading " No pension, no Olympics" during a demonstration against the French Government's pension reform hours after it was signed into law in Rennes, western France, on April 15, 2023. Photo: LOU BENOIST/AFP.

The amendments became law after the text was published before dawn in France’s official journal, with the livid opposition claiming that Macron had moved to smuggle it through under cover of night.

The publication came just hours after the approval on Friday by the Constitutional Council of the essence of the legislation, including the headline change of raising the retirement age from 62 to 64.

The standoff with unions and the left has become the biggest challenge of the second mandate of Macron, who will now address France on the crisis on Monday evening, the Elysee presidential palace said.

Trade unions called for mass Labour Day protests on May 1, and sometimes violent demonstrations erupted in several cities including Paris overnight after the court verdict was announced.

Socialist leader Olivier Faure said Macron’s swift signing of the law showed “disdain” towards the protest movement while hard-left MP Francois Ruffin called it a “democratic hold-up”.

“A law enacted in the middle of the night, like thieves,” tweeted French Communist Party chief Fabien Roussel. “Everyone on the street May 1.”

“Macron tried to intimidate all of France in the middle of the night,” tweeted hard-left leader Jean-Luc Melenchon, calling Macron a “thief of life” who showed an “absurd display of arrogance”.

The CGT union leader Sophie Binet called the move “totally shameful”.

Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne vowed Saturday the government would press ahead with more reforms. “We are determined to accelerate” the pace of reforms, she told the national council of Macron’s Renaissance party.

“We want to build a France of full employment … to guarantee equal opportunity,” she said.

The western city of Rennes was again the scene of clashes Saturday afternoon as police used tear gas on projectile-throwing protesters, AFP correspondents said.

A bank was damaged while radical protesters also stormed the lobby of a luxury hotel. One policeman was injured and eight people arrested.

‘Not defeated’

The nine-member Constitutional Council ruled in favour of key provisions of the pension reform, including raising the retirement age to 64 and extending the years of work required for a full pension, saying the legislation was in accordance with French law.

Six minor proposals were rejected, including forcing large companies to publish how many over-55s they employ, and the creation of a special contract for older workers.

The appearance of the text in France’s Official Journal — the gazette of record — means it has now been enacted into law.

But the constitutional court’s decision could prove a hollow victory for Macron, as analysts say it has come at a major personal cost for the 45-year-old.

The president’s approval ratings are near their lowest levels ever, and many voters have been outraged by his decision to ram the pensions law through parliament without a vote, using a legal but controversial mechanism denounced by opponents as anti-democratic.

Polls consistently show that two out of three French people are against working a further two years.

Macron has called the change “necessary” to avoid annual pension deficits forecast to hit 13.5 billion euros ($14.8 billion) by 2030, according to government figures.

France lags behind most of its European neighbours, many of which have hiked the retirement age to 65 or above.

“Stay the course. That’s my motto,” Macron said Friday as he inspected Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, four years after a devastating fire nearly destroyed the gothic monument.

Government spokesman Olivier Veran said Macron’s address Monday evening would be in the spirit of “pacification”.

But the left-wing Liberation daily headlined: “Not defeated: opponents of the reform are not going to disarm”.

‘Tidal wave’ on May 1

Binet and other union bosses have called for a “popular and historic tidal wave” of people on the streets to oppose the reforms on May 1.

Unions rejected an offer by Macron for talks on Tuesday, saying they would only meet after May 1.

Last month, a strike by Paris garbage workers left the capital strewn with 10,000 tonnes of uncollected rubbish.

As a prelude to the May 1 protests, railway unions are calling for a day of “railway anger” on April 20.

In a second decision on Friday, the constitutional court rejected a bid from opposition lawmakers to force a referendum on an alternative pension law that would have kept the retirement age at 62.

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Azerbaijan vehemently rejects the accusation it bears responsibility for the riots that have led to the deaths of five people and rattled the Paris government.

But it is just the latest in a litany of tensions between Paris and Baku and not the first time France has accused Azerbaijan of being behind an alleged disinformation campaign.

The riots in New Caledonia, a French territory lying between Australia and Fiji, were sparked by moves to agree a new voting law that supporters of independence from France say discriminates against the indigenous Kanak population.

Paris points to the sudden emergence of Azerbaijani flags alongside Kanak symbols in the protests, while a group linked to the Baku authorities is openly backing separatists while condemning Paris.

“This isn’t a fantasy. It’s a reality,” interior minister Gérald Darmanin told television channel France 2 when asked if Azerbaijan, China and Russia were interfering in New Caledonia.

“I regret that some of the Caledonian pro-independence leaders have made a deal with Azerbaijan. It’s indisputable,” he alleged.

But he added: “Even if there are attempts at interference… France is sovereign on its own territory, and so much the better”.

“We completely reject the baseless accusations,” Azerbaijan’s foreign ministry spokesman Ayhan Hajizadeh said.

“We refute any connection between the leaders of the struggle for freedom in Caledonia and Azerbaijan.”

In images widely shared on social media, a reportage broadcast Wednesday on the French channel TF1 showed some pro-independence supporters wearing T-shirts adorned with the Azerbaijani flag.

Tensions between Paris and Baku have grown in the wake of the 2020 war and 2023 lightning offensive that Azerbaijan waged to regain control of its breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region from ethnic Armenian separatists.

France is a traditional ally of Christian Armenia, Azerbaijan’s neighbour and historic rival, and is also home to a large Armenian diaspora.

Darmanin said Azerbaijan – led since 2003 by President Ilham Aliyev, who succeeded his father Heydar – was a “dictatorship”.

On Wednesday, the Paris government also banned social network TikTok from operating in New Caledonia.

Tiktok, whose parent company is Chinese, has been widely used by protesters. Critics fear it is being employed to spread disinformation coming from foreign countries.

Azerbaijan invited separatists from the French territories of Martinique, French Guiana, New Caledonia and French Polynesia to Baku for a conference in July 2023.

The meeting saw the creation of the “Baku Initiative Group”, whose stated aim is to support “French liberation and anti-colonialist movements”.

The group published a statement this week condemning the French parliament’s proposed change to New Caledonia’s constitution, which would allow outsiders who moved to the territory at least 10 years ago the right to vote in its elections.

Pro-independence forces say that would dilute the vote of Kanaks, who make up about 40 percent of the population.

“We stand in solidarity with our Kanak friends and support their fair struggle,” the Baku Initiative Group said.

Raphael Glucksmann, the lawmaker heading the list for the French Socialists in June’s European Parliament elections, told Public Senat television that Azerbaijan had made “attempts to interfere… for months”.

He said the underlying problem behind the unrest was a domestic dispute over election reform, not agitation fomented by “foreign actors”.

But he accused Azerbaijan of “seizing on internal problems.”

A French government source, who asked not to be named, said pro-Azerbaijani social media accounts had on Wednesday posted an edited montage purporting to show two white police officers with rifles aimed at dead Kanaks.

“It’s a pretty massive campaign, with around 4,000 posts generated by (these) accounts,” the source told AFP.

“They are reusing techniques already used during a previous smear campaign called Olympia.”

In November, France had already accused actors linked to Azerbaijan of carrying out a disinformation campaign aimed at damaging its reputation over its ability to host the Olympic Games in Paris. Baku also rejected these accusations.