"
Today, numbers don't matter
."
The statement by Philippe Martinez, secretary general of the CGT, set the tone for this fifth day of demonstration against the pension reform project.
Between the holidays for two out of three school zones, the vagaries of the weather and the natural erosion of a protest movement that began almost a month ago, we expected a lot fewer people in the streets this Thursday.
A hypothesis that has been verified in the majority of the more than 200 places chosen to pound the pavement.
Starting with the big cities where the decline was particularly marked.
They were 6,700 in Rennes today according to the authorities against 17,000 during the first demonstration (Thursday January 19), 14,000 in Toulouse against 36,000 in January.
In Nice, the police counted 2,000 demonstrators today against 7,500 at the start of the movement.
With a few exceptions.
In Le Havre (Seine-Maritime), they were 7,500 to parade.
A figure down slightly but in the same order of magnitude as the previous ones.
Peripheral France at the center of the protest
It is the medium-sized cities that now act as the hotbed of opposition to government reform.
Albi in the lead.
It is in the Tarn prefecture that the main union leaders met to parade this afternoon, with 10,000 demonstrators counted on arrival.
A figure higher than in many large cities, even if the previous days had already gathered many protesters in this town of 50,000 inhabitants, which has become the epicenter of the protest.
Other towns stood out this afternoon.
In Châtellerault in Vienne, there were still 2,300 people in the streets.
Not far from the 2,500 people present on the first day of the movement.
We should also mention Vendôme (Loir-et-Cher), Rochefort (Charente-Maritime), Douai (Nord), Saint-Omer (Pas-de-Calais) and Le Puy-en-Velay (Haute-Loire).
