General strike against pension attacks sees huge protests

[blindpig]

General strike against pension attacks sees huge workers’ protests

Sarkozy forced to mouth concessions but fight set to escalate

In an enthusiastic response to the call by the major French trade union organisations, a flood of workers went onto the streets of France on Tuesday, 7 September for a “day of massive strikes and demonstrations” in protest against the government’s major attack on the country’s pension system.

A total of two and a half million demonstrators, according to the CFDT union federation (two and three quarters according to the CGT) took to the streets in 220 protests across the whole of France. The union ‘Solidaires’ is even saying there were more than 3 million participants. Whatever is the exact figure, one thing is certain: the mobilisation has clearly far exceeded the previous one in June, and represents one of the biggest mobilisations of the French working class for years.

Even the government official channels have been forced to admit it. They gave a figure of 1.12 million compared with their estimate of 800,000 in June. “There was a very big number of workers who never usually participate in demonstrations,” commented Leila Messaoudi, member of Gauche Révolutionnaire (the French section of the CWI), who was on Tuesday’s demonstration in Rouen.

(snip)

For decades now, every mass movement in France has thrown up the spectre of another ‘‘68’. In May 1968, the biggest general strike in history posed sharply the question of whether capitalism would survive. While capitalism did survive, because there was no sizeable force able to show what concrete steps were needed to achieve that goal, 1968’s movement won huge genuine reforms for the French working class. But even that semi-revolutionary movement began with hesitations and confusion about what the alternative to De Gaulle’s government was. While this Autumn’s movement in France has many differences with 1968, it is gathering momentum that could carry it further.



more here:
http://socialistworld.net/doc/4513

[Starry Messenger]

1. k & r

[blindpig]

2. kick

[leftstreet]

3. Tons of people in Bastille Square on Oct 2

People rally on October 2, 2010 at the Bastille square in Paris, during a demonstration against President Nicolas Sarkozy's plan to raise the retirement age.The last day of action on September 23 ended up as an argument over how many people took part: police said numbers were down from the previous September 7 protest at around one million, unions said they were up at three million. Public support for the protests is growing, according to an opinion poll published in L'Humanite daily on Saturday which said that 71 percent of French supported or sympathised with the action, while 12 percent were opposed.
http://www.daylife.com/photo/00Wkdqk1n36ql?q=sarkozy+protest

:thumbsup:

K&R

[blindpig]

4. French unions call for open ended strikes

PARIS (Reuters) - France's rail unions on Wednesday called open-ended strikes from October 12, adding to national strikes already planned that day, in an escalation of protests over the centre-right government's unpopular pension reforms.

The call, at a time when austerity has put unions on a war footing elsewhere in Europe, follows a series of one-day protests against President Nicolas Sarkozy's flagship reform and came after a meeting of rail unions in Paris.

"At this stage, we have no choice but to go radical," said Bruno Duchemin, a spokesman for the CFDT-Fgaac union, one of the main unions at the SNCF state rail company along with the CGT.

Unions have also called for open-ended strikes on Paris's urban transport network on October 12 and thereafter.

more here:
http://af.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idAFTRE6953ME20101006?feedType=RSS&feedName=worldNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+reuters%2FAFRICAWorldNews+%28News+%2F+AFRICA+%2F+World+News%29

[maryf]

5. Why can't we get this going here?

K&R