Jacques Serais 06:59, March 24, 2023

Gendarmes and policemen injured, and scenes of chaos in several cities of France. The ninth day of mobilization against the pension reform was marked by an increase in violence. However, the old, Emmanuel Macron had spoken in order to appease the social climate. But two days after the presidential speech, the executive is as if distraught.

The interview of Emmanuel Macron this Wednesday on TF1 and France 2, was supposed to appease anger after the adoption by 49-3 of the pension reform. It had the opposite effect. "This is the worst-case scenario," said a disappointed adviser to the executive. Because this speech, instead of closing the retirement chapter, seems to have galvanized opponents of the reform.

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At the national level, more than a million French people marched in the streets this Thursday, during the ninth day of mobilization. As for the Parisian procession, according to police figures, it reached a record since the beginning of the mobilization, namely 119,000 demonstrators.

"Violence is the most worrying"

Figures and especially images that give some cold sweats in Macronia. "The violence in our country... This is the most worrying factor today. Much more than the insoluble political equation of the moment," analyses a close friend of the president.

Because if the head of state referred to it during his last intervention - the storming of the capitol in the United States, the invasion of places of power in Brazil - it is because the threat is taken very seriously in his entourage.

"What if France was the next country?" asks the adviser pessimistically. The only solution on the horizon in the eyes of a heavyweight of the majority: "dissolution".