PARIS (Reuters) – A million or more people marched in cities across France yesterday in the latest protest against President Nicolas Sarkozy’s flagship pension reform, and refinery strikes squeezed fuel at airports.
The government said turnout was down significantly on a rally last weekend against the push to raise the retirement age, but unions said the numbers were stable and vowed to maintain pressure to drop the plans ahead of a Senate vote on Tuesday.
Only minor scuffles were reported during yesterday’s marches, which came on top of five-day old rail and refinery strikes which have piled pressure on the centre-right government.
Jet fuel supply was restored to a key pipeline yesterday, easing the pressure at Paris airports, but week-long strikes at all France’s refineries could pinch supply hard from next week.
Truck drivers, the big guns of French protests, will start to block roads from this evening, a union spokesman said.
But Labour Minister Erich Woerth, who is piloting the changes through parliament, said he thought the government’s message was beginning to get through.
“The turnout is clearly down, but there are still a lot of people in the street,” he said on i-Tele.
“I think the French people have understood that pension reform is essential and necessary,” he said.
Sarkozy is determined to stand firm on his plans to raise the retirement age and stem a ballooning pension shortfall, but unions view the reform as unfair and have staged weeks of demonstrations to try to force him to back down.
France’s CGT and CFDT unions said between 2.5 million and 3 million people joined street demonstrations from Toulouse to Rouen, down from the last weekend march on Oct. 2 and also from a Tuesday protest unions said was joined by 3.5 million.
