on Reunion Island, Raphaël Glucksmann discusses questions of purchasing power

The parade of candidates and representatives for the European elections continues in Reunion. The head of the PS and Place Publique list begins a three-day visit to the Indian Ocean island.

White shirt and big smile. Overseas is an almost obligatory passage for the headliners of the campaign for the European elections. After Jean-Luc Mélenchon, Marine Tondelier and Marine Le Pen, it is the turn of Raphaël Glucksmann to land on the island in the Indian Ocean. The head of the PS and Place Publique list began a three-day visit on Friday, April 19, and he immediately went to contact residents at the Saint-Paul market.

The first challenge for the candidate is to be recognized by potential voters. The socialist mayor of Saint-Denis, Ericka Bareigts, is there to make the presentations. But a little further on, a fruit and vegetable seller calls out to Raphaël Glucksmann: “We need Europe!” “What do you need from Europe?”asks the head of the list. “Money and help”she replies, making the audience laugh before becoming more serious: “We are 10,000 kilometers away, with a kilo of onions for 10 euros fighting for us? We need you!”

“It is the margins that constitute the pricesays Raphaël Glucksmann. What we want to bring to the European level is a directive, a law on transparency in price formation so that people know where the price increase comes from.”

“I am addressing all voters”

Purchasing power is the number one concern in Reunion. This is also the main theme of Marine Le Pen, also visiting the island. “It proves that the Reunion is fundamental and that it is important”, launches the head of the list PS-Place Publique, who does not want to say more about his opponents. We still point out to him that in Reunion, the number one party is La France insoumise. So will he address Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s voters?

“I am addressing all the voters, and then, I am sure that a large part of them voted for Jean-Luc Mélenchon and that they are coming to join us because we are proposing a vision which is radical in transformation. The ecological transformation that we are carrying out on a European scale, it is massive but realistic in the means to achieve it”, assures Raphaël Glucksmann.

Next to him, Olivier Faure nods. The first secretary of the PS explains to us why, according to him, the Glucksmann list is best placed on the left according to the polls: “The results first, that of the delegation to the European Parliament which fought for platform workers, the uberized, which fought against the multinationals and therefore which, today is experiencing a craze because it is a positive offer which seeks to say what Europe can produce.” A message that the socialists will carry for three days to the 700,000 potential voters of this island in the Indian Ocean.