It's not the big night yet, but here, everyone dreams of it.  Monday, at the  University of Saint-Denis, all Parisian colleges sent representatives to coordinate the  entry of young people into the protest.

We can see for a week and a half every night there are night demonstrations  , riots in Paris but also in smaller towns throughout the France etc.

There are more and more people who want to go and who want to win.

We're going to win fuck, we're going to win!

The government's choice to pass its pension law without Parliament's approval ten days ago with the famous article 49.3 has provoked the anger of students. Like that of Lorélia, a member of the far-left collective Le Poing Levé.

We are all together against Macron and we will be in solidarity with all those who will suffer the repression of this police, when it bludgeons refiners, when it bludgeons students there is no difference and it is not a question of ultra-left and we must be very clear about this.   There you go.

The 23-year-old student  talks more about repression than retirement. But no matter, she is convinced: the mobilization of young people can change the movement.

When we go out on the streets it is to say that we want another change in society, we are against an entire system. In fact we are more on a question of pension reform.  Now it is a challenge to defend another society! We can really bring down this government. I think that there he is 2 fingers away from breaking. It shows and that's why it represses so much. But we must keep strength and continue the mobilization!

1’35’’ TITLE  REBELS WITH A CAUSE

AMBIENT MUSIC : All Along The Watchtower, Jimi Hendrix

Tuesday morning, picket at the entrance/in front of a TGV maintenance center in the suburbs of Paris. Here, railway workers have been blocking many  of the trains that have been leaving for the west of the country for weeks.

Lorélia, the student got up at dawn to come and support them.

Ca va ?

Are you okay , are you okay?

She  reunites with Clement, a Heminot he whom she  met in 2019, during Macron's first attempt to push through  his reform.

2'13''Clément Allochon

We meet again, it's great these links they stay ....

2’18’’Lorélia Frejo

In fact that's the thing about the strike, what Clément said, it's a moment where links that could not be created before are created because I would not have met a railway worker I think if I had not been in this struggle ...

 

Clement is 26 years old. He is a shop steward, on strike since March 7. He is a figure of the movement. And this morning he is rather solicited

2'40''Synth : I told my parents that I was on BFM so I think they are in front of the TV

2'44''Synth : The youth it begins to go out in the street and now, in  reality we see that there is a radicalization of the movement and for us itgoes in the right direction

LCI

2'54''Synth : We will harden the movement, we will continue in this direction

Et Andy….

Thank you very much... It's great I love the intonation when you do these interwievs, it's great, it's a maintenance technician, the trains can't leave, I think  it's great the intonation and everything... It's quite a job in reality...

 

Like Lorelia, Clement is already almost an old activist. He started working at the age of 15. Railwayman like his father.

For nearly 20 days, he has not left his workplace.  But this morning, exception.  Before the big demonstration of the afternoon, he goes to the Gare de Lyon for a rally in honor of a colleague.  Sébastien, blinded during the demonstration of March 23.  The scene was even filmed. At that moment  the railway worker was to the  right of the police when the grenade exploded.

 

A big thank you to everyone for coming for this10th day of mobilization. We are also especially here for our comrade Sébastien of the blow blinded last Thursday ...

4'02''Clément Allochon

Basically he assisteda personon the ground and there is a grenade that was thrown into a bell and he received a shrapnel in the eye what.  We are here to support him

You are never afraid in the demonstrations

It can happen to us, we know what we are facing. Anyway s this  repression we know that it has existed for a long time, that's it, since the movement of yellow vests. We have seen blinded people who  have lost limbs, who have lost hands, arms, eyes.

What do you have in your hand?

 It's the railwayman's sword when we go to a demonstration.  It is a smoke bomb in reality.  En manif is the specialty of railway workers

Off on rail images

We Swiss have the impression that you are always angry

I do not agree, there is so much injustice, do not let it happen... Do not let yourself be scratched in this way ... when we see the government how it despises us, Macron last time he spoke, it was contemptuous in fact, to say that we do not understand, as if everyone was stupid. In fact everyone has understood what is happening

 

Sébastien is not the only one to have been injured.  For  the  past ten days, images of demonstrators brutalized by the police have multiplied. To the point of alarming the  Council of Europe, which evokes an excessive use of force.  Wounded, but also   mass arrests.

This is what happened to Aimé-Céleste, a  19-year-old law and philosophy student.  He found himself  facing the BRAV-M motorcycles ten days ago.  Lined up against a wall in a square.  Searched.

6'25''Aimé-Céleste Karege

And then they put us on a bus with 50 protesters.  They dropped people in dribs and drabs, in the police stations of Paris. So we did a little bit t out the tour of Paris, police stations, 5th, police station of  the  17th, the 18th.   Itlasted 4 hours.  There were no places at all it was full of demonstrators.  In fact theydidn't have the  means to keep t ort the world, that's why  itlasted so long...

Video bus

We're here, we're here...

A demo on a police bus.  The supper is surreal. Hethen stays 10 hours in garde on sight.  Then he wasarrested   a 2nd time, just  a few hours after leaving the police station.  This time it will be 48 hours of cell.

We  were mixed with  people who had nothing to do with the demonstrations. I was in a cell with qq arrested for domestic violence...  There is a gentleman we do not know, who tells us that he has done 10 years in prison and who tells us that if he goes out, he will kill his wife, and we are here, we just went to demonstrate...

Emeline his girlfriend, also a student, is still a little shocked....

7'32''Emeline Le Flem

I have not  been in custody but I have  the impression that all this motivated us even more to see how  violent itcould be and that we have the impression of not being respected either.

Aimé-Céleste had a judicial control that prohibited him from travelling to any part of Paris. A project planned for September. But he filed a complaint and it is with a smile on his face that he leaves for the big demo that begins / begins at 2 pm.  No way to miss it.

Oh there's the police trucks...

Retirement at 60, we fought to win it.... We will fight to keep it

It's weird when we hear  you, the retirement we fought for thea gagner, you were not born?

Yes yes, weare focused on a more global  movement, a social movement, a françaiworkers' movement  and it's not just us.  It's our parents, it's the people we've lived with forever.

A few steps into the procession, Clément harangues the crowd and fills the union's war chest.

Clement:

Support the railwaymen of chatillons. Help us to hold the renewal, thank you madam, thank you sir

Hello!

 How old are you

19 years old...

Emeline:

We had come with my camarade on the picket Ivry garbage collector, they were happy to see us

Clement:

It feels good, it felt good to see fellow students or other sectors supporting us, it's huge...

We don't want it!

The tug-of-war with the government iscostly.  For 20 days, Clément has not been paid. It is the strike fund that compensates

9'34''Clément Allochnon

I had to lose up to 1200 euros already  at the stadium at the I'm in.  So it's important for tenir, evenfor colleagues.  After me I have moyens to hold. I'm used to doing  this,  so this jump into the void it doesn't scare me so much. But I know that there are some colleagues, they this is the first time they hold in time like this ...  And really them, for them the strike fund unfortunately  it's something they need

Macron is waging war on us and so is his police, and so is his police.

Lorélia, too, is in the demonstration.  Always motivated

And we will go, and we will go until the withdrawal....

Anti , anti-capitalist!

In the adjacent streets, the CRS are ready to intervene.  An impressive device.  Even if on this day, they will remain relatively discreet.

The lendemain, we find Clément.  Heleft his orange railway jacket to join students at the University of Nanterre...  The estation demodid not mobilize as much as he had hoped.  The media are talking about a mobilization that is waning.  But he filled his strike fund.

Clement

We recovered exactly 7958 euros.

He  is  tired, a little disappointed, even if he is not the type to resign himself.

Defeat is a possibility but I actually think there is also a victory. Today we have gone beyond the framework of pension reform. The majority of people France it also byslow from another society, from a better society.

A new world is also what Loriela is fighting for.  The day after the demonstration, she left to mobilize the troops at the Sorbonne.  For her, the fight is just beginning.

 

11’30’’Lorélia Frejo

This mobilization made it possible to create links between garbage collectors and students.   That's what the system we live in never allows. All these social ties that we create in the mobilization they also express the world we would like to build.

Isn't it a bit utopian?

I don't know if it's utopian, in any case I think what is utopian is to   think that this system that  is destroying the planet, which is destroying today the world in which we live, it is viable... 

 

11’57’’ Credits

Beatrice Guelpa

Stéphane Tasty

Joachim Chevalier

Laurence Dussey

Benoît Mayer

 

 

 

 

 

 

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