The showdown continues. Five days after a renewed mobilization, tarnished by numerous excesses, the social movement leaves for a tour. With its usual share of strikes and blockades.

Train traffic, disrupted for three weeks, remains limited with three TGVs out of five and one TER out of two on average according to the SNCF. Difficulties also in Paris transport, where the RATP has reduced traffic on most metro and RER lines.

Getting around by car is not necessarily easier, with 15% of petrol stations running out of at least one fuel, especially in the West and South - a consequence of the shutdown of five of the country's seven refineries.

Even on foot, you sometimes have to squeeze between the waste, especially in Paris where 7,300 tons of uncollected garbage still litter the sidewalks.

In primary education, 30% of teachers will be on strike according to the FSU, the main union.

Inconveniences assumed by the unions, starting with the CGT, whose outgoing leader, Philippe Martinez, repeated Monday that "the objective is the withdrawal" of the reform and that "there is no reason not to believe it".

CFDT Secretary General Laurent Berger (L) and CGT Secretary General Philippe Martinez (C) during a demonstration against the pension reform, on March 23, 2023 in Paris © Emmanuel DUNAND / AFP/Archives

At the CFDT, Laurent Berger said he expected "a very strong move from the government" on the flagship measure of the postponement of the legal age: "He must say + the 64 years will not apply +".

But the spokesman of the executive, Olivier Véran, immediately closed the door by saying that "the law on pensions is behind us".

"Boom in colleges"

At the Elysee, where Emmanuel Macron received Monday the executives of the majority and the government, the head of state said he wanted to "continue to reach out to the union forces", but on other subjects, according to a participant.

The dialogue of the deaf could continue in this way until the decision of the Constitutional Council, expected within three weeks. At the risk of adding tension, when the Prime Minister, Elisabeth Borne, intends to "appease".

Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne during a meeting with Renaissance executives in Matignon, March 27, 2023 © Ludovic MARIN / AFP

Many are concerned about the "chaos" since the use of 49.3 to pass the bill. The clashes during the last demonstrations, then the clashes around the basin of Sainte-Soline during the weekend, attest to a deleterious climate.

In this context, at least 150 rallies are planned in France for the tenth day of protest. Surprised by the scale of the mobilization Thursday - 1.09 million participants according to the Interior, more than 3 million according to the unions - the authorities count this time on a total of 650,000 to 900,000 demonstrators, including 70,000 to 100,000 in Paris.

Crowds framed by 13,000 police and gendarmes, including 5,500 in the capital, an "unprecedented security device", said at a press conference the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, who called "solemnly each and everyone to calm" and evoked the possible presence in Paris of "more than 1,000 radical elements".

In the capital, the procession will connect in the afternoon the Place de la République to that of the Nation. Accused of violence by the demonstrators, the police are preparing to face "a much larger presence of young people", according to a police source who predicts "a doubling, even a tripling" of their number compared to previous mobilizations.

Demonstration of high school students against the pension reform, March 11, 2023 in Montpellier © Sylvain THOMAS / AFP / Archives

"The 49.3 has made a lot of people +deter+," says Gwenn Birrier, 20, a student at SciencesPo Bordeaux who participated Monday in a general assembly on a campus occupied for several days.

"Since the adoption of 49.3, it has boomed in colleges," confirms Marion Beauvalet, 26, who blocked his establishment in Paris-Dauphine Monday morning with other members of the union Alternative. Similar actions are expected to multiply Tuesday in universities and high schools.

© 2023 AFP