On the eve of a new day of mobilization against the pension reform, Emanuel Macron goes this Monday to Mont-Saint-Michel, symbol of “the French spirit” of “resilience” and “resistance”. Continuing a memorial itinerary started on May 8 with a tribute to Jean Moulin in Lyon, he will also launch preparations on Tuesday for the 80th anniversary of the Allied landings of June 6, 1944, which will take place in 2024.
Will the Head of State make the link with political news, punctuated in recent weeks by the long pension crisis, while his popularity rating is rebounding after several months of strong mistrust? Since François Mitterrand in 1983, presidents have flocked to this emblematic place to convey their message. In 2007, Nicolas Sarkozy chose to launch his presidential campaign there.
The site of Mont-Saint-Michel, faced with recurring problems of silting, was the subject of gigantic works, completed in 2015, to allow it to become an island again. Already in 1983, François Mitterrand had come there to say that man had to come to the aid of nature to repair what he himself had helped to destroy.
The busiest site in the country outside Île-de-France, Mont-Saint-Michel attracted 2.8 million visitors last year, including 1.3 million for the abbey. It will not be closed to visitors during the presidential visit, but the prefect of La Manche has set up a protective perimeter, with searches at the entrance, for the millennium commemorations. The head of state was regularly greeted by pot concerts during his travels after the adoption of the pension reform in mid-April. And the executive will again face a day of mobilization on Tuesday, two days before the examination in Parliament of a bill to repeal the retirement age at 64.
