Do the Greens know who they are, where they are going and what they want? At the end of the first of the three summer days 2023 organized in Le Havre from August 24 to 26, doubt seemed permitted. In theory, the party should line up in battle order. In just ten months, in June 2024, the most successful election is looming, that of the Europeans: 13.47% of the votes in 2019, which made EELV the first force on the left.
In practice, confusion reigns. Down to the details. Thus, the food served in Le Havre is exclusively vegetarian, while the party has many organic breeders among its activists and elected officials, starting with a historical figure, José Bové (absent in Le Havre), head of the 2009 European list. This is also true for the name, so important in politics. Should we keep the acronym Europe Écologie-Les Verts (EELV), return to the “Greens”, as most other European parties do, or choose “Les Écologistes”, as proposed by the national secretary, Marine Tondelier? The question will be decided on October 14, during a refoundation agreement.
There is also, during these days, an eloquent silence on nuclear power. In one year, from September 2021 to September 2022, the proportion of French people in favor of the construction of new reactors jumped 14 points, from 51% to 65%, according to polls carried out regularly by Harris Interactive. The French electorate must now be considered three quarters (75%) as pro-nuclear, which remains to this day incompatible with membership of EELV! “The refusal of military nuclear power and the commitment in favor of the exit from civilian nuclear power” appear in the statutes. This major subject was not included in the program of any of the workshops of the Le Havre days, whereas it is inseparable from fundamental questions for any party that wants to be a government: renewable energies, industrial relocation, energy sovereignty, electric car, etc. In the “mandate report” for the first year of the Green MPs, distributed to the public, nuclear power is dispatched in half a page, like menstrual leave and the supervision of seasonal rentals (a theme dear to Paris MP Julien Bayou, met in Le Havre, but who did not speak).
Even François Ruffin did not talk about it. He nevertheless carved out a great success by breaking the sluggishness of the interventions which had preceded his, jostling the militants without complex. “In the rural world, among those who earn 1,500 to 2,500 € and among those over 60, we get beaten up by the National Rally! he hammered. This is likely to last. It appears from a questionnaire, posted online as part of the Estates General of Ecology from February to August 2023, that EELV sympathizers are not interested in rurality. She comes dead last in what they believe should be the party’s priorities, with 9% of choice. Two times less than feminist struggles and intersectionality. The cause of this disdain for the France of the cantons? Perhaps a certain “social racism”, launches François Ruffin. The Nupes in general and the Greens in particular would be a little too condescending with France “bobs, campsites, and I don’t even dare to talk about barbecues…”.
“The lesson side is a warning point”, warns the deputy of the Somme. For those who would have listened with a distracted ear, he insists. His daughter learned and sang The Lakes of Connemara wholeheartedly when she was little and he had no problem with that. François Ruffin is not content to provoke. He lays out his tactics, explains to the audience why taking an interest in the condition of social workers, as he does, is an electorally wise choice. “It’s a million women, it’s a much-loved profession, and they’re moving into old age,” making them valuable opinion leaders. The room rises and applauds. She will partially empty herself and fall back into a gentle apathy afterwards, despite the efforts of the LFI deputy for Seine-Saint-Denis Raquel Garrido to make the audience vibrate.
Time seems to be playing for Marine Le Pen, Éric Piolle in turn will agree at the end of the afternoon. “Tendentially, we are not there,” insists the EELV mayor of Grenoble. If nothing changes within the left, victory seems unattainable. His conclusion: “You have to bring about ruptures. We cannot continue as we are doing today. “At his side, Alexis Corbière pounded Emmanuel Macron for long minutes, but the repeated warning of the LFI deputy, “Beware of personal power! », directed against the Head of State, can also be understood as a criticism of the internal functioning of the Insoumis. Éric Piolle seizes the ball, calling for reflection “on the figure of the charismatic leader”. With the left not having a “natural candidate”, he said, “risk-taking is inevitable”. “We have to think about a form of collective,” says Éric Piolle, without specifying the outlines.
6:15 p.m., the dreaded and expected hour of dialogue on the sofa between Medina and Marine Tondelier is approaching. The room of the Docks of Le Havre is filling up, the rapper’s supporters are setting up. Two tight rows of journalists await him at the edge of the stage. As he enters (millimeter beard, loose beige suit), he is acclaimed as no personality has been before him during the day. In his introductory remarks, he talks about the local topography. The middle-class lower town and the working-class upper town are linked as much as they are separated by the Jenner tunnel, nearly 700 meters long. Medina would therefore intervene on the docks as a representative of popular Le Havre.
Marine Tondelier, from the outset, is confined to the role of interrogator, barely corrosive. For forty-five minutes, she will review the many slippages of the rapper. Practiced (he has apologized dozens of times), Medina resituates, nuances, clarifies. The song “Don’t Laïk”, where he says Let’s crucify the laycards like in Golgotha? It has been misunderstood, it is actually a “hymn to secularism”, but the real one, that of the origins. The Dieudonné-style quenelle? He didn’t know what it meant, “everyone was in the dark at some point.” His “Islamo-caillera” postures? It’s a ruse, a way to advance in these neighborhoods “which convey anti-Semitic ideas”, explains Médine. He presents his music as “the vehicle for deconstructing these ideas”. Marine Tondelier nods her head. She compares him to Georges Brassens, also subversive, in his time.
Impossible to ignore the very recent pun on the name of the essayist Rachel Khan, “ResKhanpée”, dropped in a tweet by Médine. It was he who brought the controversy over his arrival to a climax. It is because of him that Édouard Philippe canceled the word of welcome he was to pronounce. Medina contrition. He fights “anti-Semitism and Islamophobia”. “I had absolutely not measured the historical and emotional burden” towards those who were affected by the Holocaust, directly or indirectly. Be careful, however, he bounces back immediately. For the past three weeks, he’s been going through “hell” because of this tweet, but he’s not complaining, because “that’s what social movements are going through” too, “because they’re criminalized.” Applause in the room. Medina relaxes, takes her ease. He is in his city, it is he who receives. “The mayor isn’t here, I’m acting,” he blurts out.
