Photo credits: Permanent Revolution
This Wednesday, the day after the day of massive mobilization of January 31 against the pension reform, nearly 450 people were present at the meeting organized by Révolution Permanente to discuss “how to win against Macron? “.
In front of a full house, Adrien Cornet, CGT TotalEnergies activist from Grandpuits and Revolution Permanente activist introduced this meeting which aimed to discuss the strategy to succeed in getting Macron to bend on his pension reform. The day after a new day of mobilization which brought together nearly 3 million demonstrators all over France, Adrien Cornet returned to the historic nature of this movement and its depth: “This is unheard of in France, we were reminded again that the working class is far from being defeated. Still on Tuesday, not a single drop of petrol came out of the refineries, there was no metro, no trains, there were a lot of young people. The private sectors were there in places yet acquired by the far right”.
Following this introduction, Fernande Bagou, cleaning worker at Onet who led a successful strike in 2017 and who was on strike on January 31 with her colleagues against the pension reform spoke. She returned to the fact that the pension reform was going to make immigrant workers ever more precarious, who work in the most arduous jobs and have to face, more than any other worker, pensions of misery. She launched a vibrant call for mobilization: “We came out in large numbers to demonstrate. We are precarious immigrant workers in cleaning, in construction, in the hotel and catering industry, they are immigrant workers. If we go out to fight, why don’t you? “.
Lorélia, an activist from the student collective Le Poing levé spoke on the dynamics of the mobilization of student and high school youth against the pension reform, much more mobilized on January 31. “This mobilization of young people is very encouraging because it is what scares the government. What is scary is this explosive cocktail that unites the youth with the workers on strike”. A mobilization of young people which could indeed constitute a major turning point if it were to mobilize even more massively.
Mouloud Sahraoui, elected and secretary of the CGT Geodis Calberson IDF union who recently led a major strike for wages with his colleagues then took the floor to denounce the government reform. An attack against all workers and in particular women, “they are the ones who will foot the bill in particular”. The CGT activist then asked about the battle plan to beat Macron “the mobilization of the 19th and 31st is encouraging, public opinion is on our side, but now the most important thing is to see how we organize ourselves to go to the general strike. The only weapon in the hands of workers is the strike”.
Frédéric Lordon, philosopher, then returned with his usual verve to the social situation. Whereas with Macron, we are dealing with a madman “, the intellectual explained why, to win, “ there is no other strategic way than blocking: you have to block, you have to block everything, you have to block everywhere, you have to bring the economy to its knees », before evoking the perspective of a society where « the workers decide. »
In conclusion, Anasse Kazib returned at length to the contradictions and challenges of a “weird” movement. Beginning by evoking the absence of the slightest hold of the workers and the trade union bases on the mobilization, he underlined the contradiction of a massive mobilization on the one hand but with still too few tendencies towards self-organization on the part of the other : “Why are we 1.8 million in the streets and no one comes to the general assembly? ».
The railway worker and Sud-Rail activist then insisted on various strategic issues: first, the need to develop self-organization to impose control from the base: “workers must make it a point of honor every morning, every day, at every general meeting to decide whether the strike continues or whether it ends”. Then the importance of developing a program that makes all the exploited want to fight, a condition for hardening the movement and building a dynamic towards the renewable strike, “the only possibility of making the government back down. Because for Emmanuel Macron to end his five-year term, it will take much more than 24-hour days.. A logic opposed to that of the inter-union which seeks to limit at all costs the force deployed in the street to isolated days.
” We can win ! »: 450 people at the special meeting for the battle of Permanent Revolution pensions