A month after the riots that shook France in response to the death of Nahel M., killed by a police officer on June 27, Emmanuel Macron delivered his analysis in remarks reported by Le Figaro magazine on Wednesday August 2. “I took care not to react hotly”, “on purpose”, claims the head of state, because “in moments of emotion we are called upon to choose sides, and therefore we always talk nonsense”. Reactivating the notion of “decivilization” that he developed in the spring, Mr. Macron believes that the violence has revealed a “crisis of civilization” and a “disorder in our societies”.
“Nearly 75% of the young people brought to justice were either on child welfare or young people from single-parent families, not counting unaccompanied minors – but these were very few in the riots. It’s a huge challenge for us, because it’s the society of tomorrow,” says the president, who says he refuses to “choose sides” between those who call for helping families to educate children and those who recommend sanction them.
“We must support these families, give many more resources, better prepare them, and at the same time make them responsible”, pleads the President of the Republic. According to him, “sanction policies” are needed when parents “are really irresponsible”, but without “removing child benefits” – a proposal which “ideologizes the debate” and would risk “aggravating the problem”, he believes.
Faced with right-wing and far-right opposition that has linked violence and immigration, Emmanuel Macron calls for “not to confuse immigration and integration”, recognizing “very clearly a problem” about the second. “These riots are not a topic of current immigration. It is a broader subject of the difficulties of certain cities, of socio-economic difficulties, of integration difficulties in certain cases and of the functioning of democracy in the age of social networks”, considered the Head of State. .
Emmanuel Macron, still looking for ways to boost his second five-year term in the absence of an absolute majority in the Assembly, announces that he will take “at the end of August a major political initiative” in order to “try to bring together around a clear and simple project all those who want to find their way, without asking them to join everything”.
“Breaking some taboos”
The Head of State specifies that this initiative will not aim to “create coalitions”. It must take place “when France is going to host major sporting events”, the Rugby World Cup in September, then the Olympic and Paralympic Games in the summer of 2024, he adds. The Elysée told Agence France-Presse that the presidential initiative would focus on themes such as ecology, public services, work, order, progress, immigration.
The Head of State will offer “to the political forces of the republican arc a series of meetings to determine projects on which to walk together”, added the presidency. By referring to this expression of “republican arch”, the Elysée shows that it intends to exclude from this approach the National Rally, party of Marine Le Pen, and La France insoumise, of Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
“I will do everything I can do until May 2027. And I will do a lot, believe me,” continues the head of state in these statements made during his trip to Oceania last week. “That’s how you stop the extremes,” he adds, calling for “a new time that must open up in the life of the country.”
“I was elected on a promise of emancipation, of modernizing France, of breaking certain taboos, which we did with results, especially on the economic and social side, adds the head of state. . Now, we can clearly see that something is at stake, which is not about living together – I don’t like this term –, but about forming a nation. »
