Objective, to reconnect with the French. After the promulgation of the pension reform, Emmanuel Macron addresses the French on Monday, April 17 at 20:00 to give his perspectives in an atmosphere of persistent political crisis and with unions turned towards May 1.

The President of the Republic did not promulgate the pension reform live on television, as he had done for the first emblematic reforms of his first term in 2017. However, Emmanuel Macron has not dragged.

"To the end contempt"

The publication in the Official Journal just hours after its partial validation by the Constitutional Council was experienced as a new provocation by opponents. "Until the end contempt," said the boss of the CFDT, Laurent Berger.

It is also a way of signifying that Monday's speech, broadcast on the main television channels, should be turned towards the rest of the five-year term. However, to pick up the pieces after three months of intense social crisis, and with an executive damaged by the use of 49.3 and still deprived of a majority in the Assembly, the task promises to be immense.

"The president wishes to be able on this occasion to have a message for the French, while this moment ends around the pension reform which undoubtedly leaves anger in the heads and in the hearts," explains one in his entourage.

Calls from opponents of the reform have flourished on social networks for concerts of pots and pans and rallies in front of town halls or prefectures at 20:00.

"Charting perspectives"

Emmanuel Macron, who will receive in the afternoon ministers and leaders of the majority, wants to the French "draw perspectives for the weeks and months to come" and "intends to sketch the sites", continues his entourage. It is a question of "reaffirming its course – republican order, full employment and reindustrialization, daily progress – but also restoring overall coherence to its action".

He should also quickly come out of the Elysée to "exchange with the French". A minister explained last week that he wanted "Macron to spend more time on the ground".

A trip could take place on Wednesday or Thursday, on the theme of education.

The invitation issued for Tuesday to the social partners is maintained, despite the end of non-reception of an inter-union unwilling to stick to the presidential agenda. The time is rather to try a show of force during the traditional appointment of May 1st.

"A popular and historic tidal wave," said the new leader of the CGT, Sophie Binet, while Laurent Berger "wants that on May 1, we 'break the barracks' in number of demonstrators in the street."

A unitary May 1st would be a first since 2002, a few days after the famous April 21st which saw a candidate of the extreme right – then Jean-Marie Le Pen – reach the second round of the presidential election for the first time.

In the meantime, the four representative unions of the SNCF call for a "day of expression of railway anger" Thursday.

"Appease the country"

Restarting the machine will be all the more difficult as the executive and the majority emerge shaken from the sequence. "We are determined to accelerate" while wanting to "appease the country," Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne said Saturday.

"A totally charred Prime Minister, a discredited government," said National Rally leader Marine Le Pen, for whom the head of state has three solutions: referendum, dissolution... or resignation.

A coalition with the right, evoked since the loss of the absolute majority in the Assembly in June 2022, still seems as unlikely as ever. Such a hypothesis supposes "a program and a leader, and LR has neither program nor leader," stings the boss of the presidential party Renaissance Stéphane Séjourné.

Other leaders of the majority, such as MoDem President François Bayrou, warned against any turn "to the left or to the right".

"Does the absence of an absolute majority prevent us from making reforms? Obviously not," evacuates an adviser to the executive.

But for the LR Xavier Bertrand, the president must "get out of denial" about his lack of majority and put "an end to all this tension" in the country, under penalty of sinking into "chaos".

With AFP

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