Some marched as superheroes, others as monsters, and one placard joked that its bearer had come costumed as a furious voter. For the third Saturday running, students, pupils and trade unionists filled French streets to protest about living costs and crumbling schools. And for the third time, the afternoon ended in clouds of tear gas.
Turnout depends on who is counting. The interior ministry tallied 320,000 people nationwide, 70,000 of them in Paris. The youth unions behind the call, including Unef and Fage, claimed close to 500,000, 200,000 of them marching in Paris. Both sets of figures were lower than a week earlier, when officials had counted 410,000.
A last-minute legal battle meant the Paris procession was routed along the city’s eastern fringe rather than through the centre. Trouble started as it reached its end point: masked groups pried up paving stones and threw them at riot police, bins were set alight, and riot units hit back with gas canisters and repeated charges. One officer was hit by a petrol bomb, an act Interior Minister Laurent Nunez called “attempted murder” while blaming far-left militants. By late evening the ministry reported 565 arrests nationwide. Police also fired tear gas in Lyon and used water cannon in Toulouse, with about 70,000 officers deployed overall.
It all began in September, when lycée pupils walked out over leaking classrooms, too few teachers and a selection process for higher education that, in their eyes, punishes kids from poorer homes. Yellow Vest veterans and the big union federations have piled in since, and the list of demands now includes the right to protest itself.
Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu held talks with student leaders this week but has little room to spend, with the economy close to recession and Paris under pressure to cut its debt. Student groups plan school and campus blockades on Tuesday and Thursday, and unions have called a national day of action on November 5. President Emmanuel Macron responded that elections, not the street, should settle the argument.
