1.12 million people demonstrated this Thursday throughout France, according to the Ministry of the Interior, including 80,000 in Paris.
Trade unions had called on the French to protest against the government's pension reform, setting the legal retirement age at 64.
In addition to the demonstrations, the protest was expressed by strikes in particular in transport, schools and the public service.
More than two million demonstrators according to the unions
For its part, the CGT announced that more than two million demonstrators had mobilized throughout France on Thursday.
More than 200 demonstrations took place in Paris and in the regions, mostly peacefully, to roll back the government on its plan to raise the legal retirement age from 62 to 64 years old.
In detail, the figures reported by the authorities attest to a very significant mobilization: 36,000 people thus marched in Toulouse, 26,000 in Marseille, 25,000 in Nantes, 19,000 in Clermont-Ferrand, 15,000 in Montpellier, 23,000 in Lyon ... A few clashes, tensions or damage were reported in Paris, Lyon and Rennes.
Follow the strike against the pension reform live
The trade unions and political organizations have therefore succeeded in reaching their objective of one million participants.
"Let's be 1 million to break into the street"
this Thursday, had launched the national secretary of the Communist Party Fabien Roussel in the
Journal Du Dimanche
this weekend.
Nationally, the levels of mobilization are comparable or even higher than those of December 5, 2019: at the start of the protest against the previous pension reform project, the police had counted 806,000 demonstrators in France, the CGT 1.5 million .
“We are clearly on a strong mobilization, beyond what we thought”
, abounded the number one of the CFDT, Laurent Berger.
His CGT counterpart Philippe Martinez spoke of a mobilization
"successful".
A mobilization similar to that of the social movements of 1995, 2003 and 2010
The demonstrations this Thursday even find the levels of mobilization against the previous pension reforms in 2003 and 1995. The "Juppé plan" which contained a section on pension reform and another on a reform of Social Security, had been to the origin of an important social movement.
On December 12 of that year, more than a million people took part in a demonstration, according to the police, and more than two million according to the trade unions.
The demonstrations were accompanied by a very important strike movement.
The government of the time ended up abandoning its reform of the special pension schemes.
In May 2003, more than two million people demonstrated in France, according to the unions (1.13 million according to the police) against the pension bill of François Fillon, then Minister of Labour.
Finally, the 2010 demonstrations also had more than a million participants according to the authorities.
Several large-scale mobilizations were organized in September and October 2010 to protest against the pension reform of Éric Woerth, Minister of Labor under the presidency of Nicolas Sarkozy.
These events bring together around a million participants each time, according to the authorities.
The largest being that of October 12, which brought together up to 3.5 million demonstrators according to the unions and 1.23 million according to the police.
The government does