Monday, July 8, 2024, 00:09
More than 15,000 people gathered in the early hours of Monday morning in Paris’ Place de la République to celebrate the victory of the left in the French elections. “It’s a bigger victory than we could have dreamed of, we’re keeping the France that resists fascism,” a young woman told the media in the middle of the crowd. There were chants, but above all there was cheering for the New Popular Front, to whose last-minute mobilisation many young people attributed the unexpected change of direction in the elections.
“Mélenchon should be the president,” said Lermain, 23, as his friends explained to him that the legislative elections were being held this Sunday, not the presidential one, which is still three years away. “The mobilisation of the neighbourhoods has been very powerful,” said one veteran amid the noise of horns that filled the centre of Paris.
The other side of the coin has been the riots by radical groups in the capital and other major cities in France. The extremists, apparently of an ultra-right ideology, have burned rubbish and furniture. The government had deployed 30,000 gendarmes in Paris, Lyon, Nice, Marseille and other cities to control this type of attack. The shielding will remain in place for at least a week. Hundreds of shopkeepers had previously boarded up their shop windows with wooden planks in anticipation of riots.
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