IN PARIS, on Saturday, against the advice of the more moderate members of the ‘Yellow Vests’ movement, 10,000 French workers and youth demonstrated their determination that Macron and his regime must go, with a number of demonstrators carrying banners demanding a ‘Frexit’.
They had been warned that the state would seek to teach them a lesson and advised that the best thing to do would be to stay away from Paris and join demonstrations in the provinces. However, the movement has qualitatively gone beyond just a concern over fuel taxes. Students, youth and workers have joined the movement in masses, and are determined to bring down the ‘Emperor’ Macron.
Driven by dire necessity, stemming from low wages for workers and and joblessness for youth, they want to see a socialist France and the expropriation of the bourgeoisie. More and more are demanding a ‘Frexit’ referendum to quit the EU. Their feeling about Saturday’s demonstration was that when Macron is forced to retreat, as he was over fuel tax rises, he must be chased out of power.
Not only were there banners calling for a ‘Frexit’, and many demonstrations outside Paris, there were demonstrations and clashes with the police and other state forces in Brussels and Amsterdam, meaning that the Brexit rebellion and the French uprising are spreading throughout Europe.
What was meant to be the day of revenge for the state forces, began with early morning raids on the homes of the movement’s leaders in Paris, with 300 early morning arrests and detentions. Then the state assembled the cream of its repressive counter revolutionary forces, 9,180 anti-riot personnel belonging to the CRS and other counter-revolutionary organisations.
The 10,000 demonstrators were faced with armoured cars, water cannon, mounted police, fusillades of rubber bullets and gas canisters, supplemented by heavily armed snatch squads. Nearly 90,000 officers had been deployed nationally, including over 8,000 in Paris where 12 armoured vehicles were also used. The demonstrators in Paris, however, stood their ground despite 1,700 arrests.
The feeling of the masses now is distinctly revolutionary. One worker said: ‘We are like the Brits who voted for Brexit. We are the people that the political leaders have never had to listen to before. However, they are having to listen now. If not it’s revolution!’
The situation is now developing rapidly, and the movement is expected to win the support of the masses for a general strike throughout France. Already the continuing blockades at fuel depots have caused shortages in Brittany, Normandy, and southeast regions of France and are having a major impact on the French economy.
The working class is now on the march throughout the EU against the super-exploitation of the working class and the youth by the bureaucratic bankers’ and bosses’ dictatorship. Currently, the Italian workers are under threat that if their national budget is not rewritten, the country will face intervention and a massive fine.
Italian government debt is already over 132% of the country’s GDP, more than double the limit of 60% insisted upon by the EU. Italy’s sovereign debt stands at well over two trillion euros. Big French banks own tens of billions of Italian sovereign debt with the largest, BNP Paribas, having over £8.7bn, followed by BPCE with 8.5bn euros and Crédit Agricole 7.6bn euros. German, Dutch and Spanish banks are also up to their necks in Italy’s sovereign debt. This means that the EU bosses will seek to give Italy the Greek treatment.
The EU’s banks are going bust. The French mass revolutionary protests are already spreading throughout Europe, while British workers have put their Brexit time-bomb under the UK bourgeoisie. Now is the time to build sections of the International Committee of the Fourth International in every country in Europe.
Their role will be to organise the victory of the socialist revolution all over Europe, smashing the EU and replacing it with the United Socialist States of Europe, bringing in a planned socialist economy under workers’ management to serve the interests of the workers of Europe. This will be a huge leap towards the complete victory of the world socialist revolution!
