Tuesday, April 2, 2019

Report: Yellow Vests Act 20: Video Reports


Report: Yellow Vests Act 20 (media heavy – loads slowly!)
[The paragraphs below introduce video clips of the various protests]


Act 20 of the Yellow Vests took place on March 30th nationwide in France and happened against the background of last week’s brutal beating of a female protestor in Nice. My reports on Acts 18 and 19 can be read here and hererespectively.

Paris
The demonstration in Paris was focused on housing expulsions, energy cuts, and expensive accommodation. It should be noted that by law in France people cannot be thrown out of their homes before April 1st, since the weather is still cold until Spring arrives. Here is a photo of the brochure I received at the prior protest in Paris on the 23rd advertising Act 20.
There were 2 protest events that took place in parallel, and then eventually merged together: a sanctioned march from Châtelet, and an unsanctioned one from Bastille. When both columns met up there was an almighty cheer, and then everyone marched through the streets up to Trocadéro as a part of the sanctioned march.

But along the way the police cut off the route on the fly, meaning the Yellow Vests had to invent a different way of reaching the end point of the sanctioned march.

Eventually some tempers started to fray and bottles and rocks started to be thrown at the police who accompanied the column. But since it was a sanctioned march the Yellow Vests had to restrain themselves (otherwise the police prefecture will not sign off an application for such a march).

At Trocadéro there were some clashes between Yellow Vests and the police, mainly in the format of glass bottle throwing being answered with flash bangs and tear gas.

But unfortunately the police had already encircled the square and did their usual “squeezing” procedure, which resulted in the Yellow Vests (and I) being forced to leave the area via the metro. Most of the shouting that can be heard in my videos comes from protesting Ghanaians, who were already at Trocadéro before the Yellow Vests came.

What happened next was very interesting, as I spent the next 15 minutes with a group of Yellow Vests, including one of the “leaders” (the person who organised today’s march), on the metro as they tried their best to keep the today’s protest alive.

The police were quick to react to their plans and closed the Place de la République metro station, meaning we all had to quickly leave the metro one stop before and go there by feet. Here is a photo I took of an info screen when I entered the metro in the evening – “On Saturday, March 30th, because of the Yellow Vests protest, certain stops/stations are closed from 08:00”. It means the police have a free hand to shut down parts of the metro whenever they want.


Elsewhere

Of course, protests took place in all major French cities, despite the fact that earlier in the week Macron banned protests in certain quarters of these cities (calling them “dead areas”). In the tweet below a Yellow Vest complains about being searched by the police 5 times just in the morning of March 30th – “It is total repression”, she says.
In Avignon it was reported that the city centre had been closed off, and in order to enter it one must be searched by the police.
When the Yellow Vests went to an area that was “forbidden” the police came down on them.



Conclusion

After what happened during Act 18 (March 16th) in Paris, the Yellow Vests are deliberately letting the media propaganda fade away before giving Macron another “ultimatum”. Hence why Act 20 was, and Acts 21 and 22 will be, calmer in comparison to Act 18 (although of course, banning protests on the Champs-Élysées had an effect). Act 23, however, will be very volatile. I didn’t see any “black block” during Act 20 in Paris, and I don’t think that this is a coincidence. They will surely come out again to “play” for Act 23. Concerning the situation in France in general, things have entered an impasse, with no prominent political figure or party able to offer the Yellow Vests what they want (even Mélenchon). And it must be said, in all fairness, that the Yellow Vests are no closer to obtaining their “Citizens’ Initiative Referendum” system of governance, for its implementation needs, in the very least, the dissolution of the parliament.
But what’s important to remember is that scandals can happen at any moment, as the beating of a 73-year-old woman in Nice showed. And this in many respects struck a strong blow to Macron’s “grand debate” PR stunt. After all, a woman holding a rainbow flag cannot be smeared by the media in the same way that a “black block” member in front of a smashed up Hugo Boss store can.

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