Several thousand people demonstrated on Saturday in a number of French cities to denounce the immigration bill carried by the Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin.
The examination of this controversial bill was postponed until the fall, but that did not prevent thousands of people from pounding the pavement in the streets of Paris, Rennes, Strasbourg or even Marseille.
In the Parisian procession, the demonstrators marched behind a banner proclaiming “No to the Darmanin law. Against repression, confinement and expulsions, for a welcoming migration policy, regularize”.
The immigration bill “is a racist law, which aims to criminalize foreigners” and lead to “more expulsions”, castigated a 31-year-old Malian illegal immigrant, quoted by the local press, participating in the rally. in the capital.
The demonstration also tended to oppose the “Wuambushu” security operation carried out by the French authorities in Mayotte, to dislodge irregular migrants, mostly Comorians, from the insalubrious slums of this overseas department.
In Rennes, more than 500 people marched, chanting in particular “Down with the police state” or “Darmanin in the Vilaine” – the river crossing the Breton capital. In Nîmes, a hundred people also gathered in front of the city’s courthouse for the same reason.
Hundreds of people also pounded the pavement in Marseille, or even in Strasbourg, where they were gathered behind two banners “No border, no nation, Freedom of movement” and “Against racism, against fascism, regularization of all without -papers”.
Deprived of a majority in the National Assembly, the French government announced last Wednesday its decision to postpone the presentation of its immigration bill until the fall. This bill wanted by the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron, was originally part of the roadmap for the “hundred days of appeasement” and “action” decreed by the head of the State, in order to turn the page on the very controversial pension reform and calm the anger of opponents of the reform.
The future bill on immigration plans in particular to deport more foreigners who represent a “serious threat”, to reform the asylum system to speed up procedures and to facilitate the regularization of certain undocumented workers.