Paris (AFP)
The exceptional will still last: Parliament is preparing to give the green light on Tuesday to an extension of the state of health emergency until June 1, but many parliamentarians are dragging their feet, even in the majority.
An exceptional diet
Created in March 2020 in the face of the Covid-19 epidemic, the state of health emergency is the basis in particular of the national curfew at 6:00 p.m.
This "toolbox" regime also allows measures to restrict or prohibit movement, gatherings or the opening of establishments, on all or part of the territory, as well as possibly partial or complete confinements of the population.
The executive will not hesitate "to take (its) responsibilities" in the event of "sharp and rapid deterioration" of health indicators, says Prime Minister Jean Castex.
Particularly in the face of variants, "successive extensions are a necessity, not a failure, not a gimmick," insisted Secretary of State Adrien Taquet before the deputies.
The health emergency was in effect from March 23 to July 10, 2020, then reinstated on October 17.
Parliament extended it until February 16, hence the need for this new vote.
Under fire from critics
All the political groups in the Assembly without a majority have announced that they will vote against.
The parliamentarians relay the weariness of the population and the fed up with restaurant owners, ski resorts and students, even threats of disobedience.
Beyond that, both right and left denounce a "trivialization" of this particular regime.
The government "must not drag us into tunnels where Parliament cannot meet and assess public action," argues MP LR Philippe Gosselin.
The Senate dominated by the right had given its agreement, at first reading, for an extension until May 3 ... and provided for a vote in Parliament after a month in the event of reconfinement, to no avail.
Communist Stéphane Peu is "worried about the government's habituation to the regime derogating from the rule of law", in which "France will have found itself most of its time since 2015" with the state of emergency post -attacks.
At the forefront, rebellious deputies speak out against "a form of dictatorship, the concentration of full powers in the hands of a man" and, in the words of François Ruffin, "an anonymous Defense Council" which takes the strategic decisions.
"It is no longer possible that one, Emmanuel Macron, decides for everyone", also believes the boss of the PS Olivier Faure.
Like other associations for the defense of public freedoms, the League of Human Rights is against an "authoritarian drift and the predominance given to the executive with the weakening of institutional and citizen checks and balances".
The government not at gunpoint
The Minister of Health Olivier Véran ensures that he understands the "weariness", his colleague Brigitte Bourguignon "fully shares" it.
But Mr. Véran considers the deadline of June 1 "consistent with regard to the dynamics of the epidemic", the time that "the vaccination campaign fully produces its effects".
The minister also insists that only "measures necessary and proportionate to the health disaster" are taken.
And the reporter Jean-Pierre Pont (LREM) to judge that those voting against the extension "oppose the fight against this virus and the protection of the population against this virus" - a "blackmail to responsibility" pinned to the left like right.
"If we discuss, we are accused of being demagogues or health traitors to the Nation," denounces Jean-Christophe Lagarde (UDI).
Even within the majority, some nuances are heard.
The MoDem group demands "transparency in responses and figures".
"We cannot give the government a blank check every three or four months", ton Olivier Becht, boss of the allied group Agir, which does not see France "cross the whole year 2021 only with containment measures, of deconfinement, re-containment or curfew ".
The National Assembly is preparing to modify its own rules of procedure on March 1 to provide for a sustainable way of organizing its work "in a period of crisis" of all kinds.
parl-reb / shu
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