All day long, this Sunday, March 15, Emmanuel Macron received photos on his mobile that amazed him: French people strolling in the sun, with family or friends, in the parks, on the banks of the Seine in Paris, who on a bicycle, riding a scooter, as if there was already a holiday air floating around since the government's decision to close schools due to the coronavirus epidemic.
"It's crazy, people are oblivious! The president thought that they had understood, we saw that not ”, storms a close friend of the Macron. "We sent the president at 8 p.m. with the utmost solemnity, the French all looked at him ... and they didn't care. So, we sent the Prime Minister, more martial, and they did not take him seriously. We have a problem, ”says a minister, dazed. "What do you want us to do?" ", Concludes a councilor of power, in a strange confession of helplessness.
VIDEO. Crowded parks in Paris despite containment measures
Sunday, returning from Le Touquet (Pas-de-Calais), where the presidential couple voted in the first round of the municipal elections, the First Lady herself, who was used to walking in Paris, took a stroll on the banks of the Seine with his bodyguards, amazed to meet so many people there and greeting onlookers while asking them to stay at a respectable distance. A few hours earlier, Brigitte Macron had already been taken aback to see people massing against each other when the presidential couple left the polling station. "People are not serious, they do not yet realize," slips a relative.
"We are moving towards general containment"
At the end of Sunday afternoon, a meeting was held between directors of cabinet to wedge the "elements of language" of the electoral evening. The goal: "empower" the French. Invited to France 2, the Minister of Health, Olivier Véran, drawn traits, implored them to be more careful. "The president is worried, he has had very alarmist reports saying that 60% of the population could be affected," shouts a macronist.
So much for the observation. Because if the executive is annoyed by the lack of discipline of the population, does it draw the immediate consequences? "What are they waiting for to decide? It's urgent! Storms a regular at the Palais. Experts in crisis management, for whom every hour counts so much the spread of the Covid-19 took an alarming turn in France - 127 dead counted Sunday, 36 more than the day before - urge the government to accelerate. "As long as you don't tell people that it's over, that we can't go out, it doesn't work!" “Thunders one.
According to concordant sources, the executive is working on measures towards a clear tightening. "We are moving towards a general containment for the middle of the week," said a Sunday official of the majority. "It will be for Tuesday, at the latest Wednesday," confirms a faithful president. Several hypotheses would be on the table: reinforced confinement, with exit restrictions; local containment for Ile-de-France and Alsace; even a curfew every evening at 6 p.m., which is debated because of its legal complexity.
Behind the scenes, orders and counter-orders multiply
"We should already be in a state of emergency!" I do not understand ... In this kind of period, you must not have your hand shaking ", gets carried away by a government source, under the guise of" off ".
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All day Sunday, orders and counter-orders multiplied behind the scenes. Invited to a new Defense Council at the Elysee Palace at 6 p.m. Monday - according to three concordant sources -, the ministers participating in it learned around 8 p.m. that it would take place later. "They probably want to first consult the parties and the scientific committee on the postponement of the second round of municipal elections," assumes a ministerial adviser. At the top of the state, we explain that we are advancing "step by step", according to very evolving information. "Everything is closed, the restaurants, the bars, it's already very drastic," said another.
VIDEO. Edouard Philippe evokes a possible postponement of the second round of the municipal elections
But how do we make the French understand the character of absolute emergency, when the first round of municipal elections has been maintained? "It is all well and good to accuse Gérard Larcher and the right in fashion: They are the culprits , but who is the leader? Where did Jupiter go? “, Calls a source in the majority, impatient to see the lightning fall.