VIDEO. “It’s not the saucepans that will move France forward”, says Emmanuel Macron on a visit to Alsace

The Head of State hopes to turn the page. While visiting a factory in Muttersholtz (Bas-Rhin), the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron, responded on Wednesday April 19 to the demonstrators who sounded pans and slogans against the government in the hours preceding its displacement. “It’s not saucepans that will move France forward”he reacted in front of journalists, assuring that “the reality of the whole country is not only those who make noise with pans or who grumble”.

The situation was very tense ahead of this visit, the first of its kind since the promulgation of the pension reform law and the speech by the President of the Republic on Monday evening. The gendarmes notably repelled a few hundred demonstrators who were protesting against the visit of Emmanuel Macron. “Last warning: we will use force”warned a gendarme using a megaphone, while a prefectural decree was issued to ban any demonstration.

During the visit, the electricity in the factory district was cut off, an act which, early Wednesday afternoon, had not been claimed. Contacted by franceinfo, the CGT of Bas-Rhin “does not invalidate” be responsible for the cut, and explains that this “was part of the options”. “We welcome it all the same, it’s like for pans, it disturbs the communication operation of the President of the Republic”, declared Laurent Feisthauer, CGT Bas-Rhin departmental secretary.