“Our democracy is teetering with violence and intimidation from the far right”, estimated Thursday, December 23 on franceinfo Sandrine Rousseau, president of the political council of the environmental candidate Yannick Jadot in the next presidential election. Activists claiming to be Eric Zemmour tried to enter his home before degrading his door overnight from Tuesday to Wednesday. She asks Emmanuel Macron to “restore the values of democracy” and the Ministry of the Interior of “conduct a survey to measure the degree of violence” which weighs on opponents on the far right.
franceinfo: How do you qualify what you were the victim of?
Sandrine Rousseau: It is intimidation. At that time, I was not in the house but my partner was there. Fortunately, my children weren’t there. The question behind it is how can we guarantee democracy? We are currently witnessing a lot of intimidation from democratic opponents.
“At one point, it must be said that the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron, is the guarantor of democracy.”
Sandrine Rousseauto franceinfo
Right now, we are in a climate where, little by little, we are sinking into intimidation to violence against political opponents and people who hold different values. This should really worry us as a priority because it is a sign of a drift in our system.
You therefore appeal to the Head of State. What are you asking him exactly?
Obviously, that it restore the values of democracy and the fact that political opponents remain people to be protected, who must not be subjected to this intimidation and violence. I think he must also condemn the violence of those who exercise it. We have seen it with the violence that took place in Eric Zemmour’s meeting, where there was no call for calm from the President of the Republic, even when Eric Zemmour spoke himself been verbally attacked in the street, Emmanuel Macron called him.
At one point, you have to tell yourself that you have a responsibility for what is happening. I think we need to realize that our democracy today is teetering with violence and intimidation from the far right. This is not trivial, it is not a small thing. It is something serious, regardless of the nature of each of the attacks. There is something of the order of the systematic.
Eric Zemmour published a statement on Twitter on Wednesday evening in which he explains that these activists are not among his supporters, before condemning the intimidation. Does this convince you? Is it sufficient ?
In himself, Eric Zemmour is the bearer of violence. We saw him in his meeting. His candidacy is the bearer of a form of violence and groups and small groups who are themselves violent rally to his candidacy. It is the responsibility of a political leader to prohibit and ensure that this does not happen. It’s too easy to say that afterwards and it’s too easy to buy yourself a course and a conscience by doing it afterwards. His responsibility is to make sure that does not happen.
Do you fear an escalation of violence to physical assault?
I think it’s up to the Ministry of the Interior to carry out an investigation to measure the degree of violence and the degree of threat addressed to us. I’m not the one who can say that.
“On the other hand, I would like the Ministry of the Interior to do this work of real assessment of the threats we are facing today. As I speak to you, I have no communication whatsoever with the ministry. inside.”
Sandrine Rousseauto franceinfo
I filed my complaint. I asked in the complaint that there be police rounds to be made on my street at night. A priori, it will be done, but I have no contact allowing me to say if I am safe or not. I may already be, but I don’t know.
Do you have the impression that this committed presidential campaign is special and quite unprecedented in terms of its level of verbal or physical violence?
Yes, there is verbal and physical violence, also on social media with threats and cyber harassment. I had already written to the DA a month ago for threats on social media and so I think we take steps every time and it feels like it’s targeted at people.
But what must be understood is that in fact, it is targeted at people to intimidate all political oppositions. This is what is very dangerous at the present time, is that in order to play politics, we have to endure this violence. However, this is not the spirit of democracy. Each citizen must be able to run for office, to run for office, without being afraid. If, in a democracy, we introduce ourselves and we begin to be afraid of threats, then democracy is dysfunctional.