Overflows in perspective? Emmanuel Macron indicated this Friday, during a press conference in Brussels, that the authorities seized “rare violence equipment” before the demonstration scheduled for Saturday, in Sainte-Soline in Deux-Sèvres. The unauthorized gathering is aimed at protesting against mega-basin projects.
“We will not give in to this violence. In a democracy, we do not have the right to violence, ”she insists.
According to authorities’ estimates, between 7,000 and 10,000 people are expected for this demonstration, including more than a thousand radicals, AFP learned from a source familiar with the matter. According to the Interior, 3,200 gendarmes and police officers will be deployed there.
Axes and petanque balls
The prefect of Deux-Sèvres Emmanuelle Dubée had already indicated this Friday during a press conference that the police had made “significant seizures of objects that constitute weapons or weapons by destination.”
She said she expected “significant violence” on Saturday.
Among the objects seized, General Samuel Dubuis, commander of the New Aquitaine gendarmerie region, listed “pétanque balls, slingshots, slingshots, blunt objects, incendiary products such as mortars, (…) knives, axes.”
Thousands of people already gathered in October
The “Bassines non merci” collective, the environmental movement of Land Uprisings and the agricultural union Confédération paysanne are at the origin of this mobilization.
“Just as the country rises up to defend pensions, we will simultaneously rise up to defend water,” they say.
It is not the first of its kind in the region. By the end of October, 4,000 people according to authorities, 7,000 according to organizers, had gathered in Sainte-Soline to voice their opposition to a water retention project. The mobilization had given rise to excesses. 61 gendarmes were injured, 22 of them seriously, out of the 1,500 deployed.
“A clear risk of disturbing public order”
Agriculture Minister Marc Fesneau called on Thursday during an interview with southwest to avoid any overflow on Saturday in Deux-Sèvres.
“The right to demonstrate is not the right to break,” he proclaimed in the columns of the local newspaper.
The minister justifies the prohibition of the meeting by “a clear risk of disturbing public order” and ensures that the “right to demonstrate” is not questioned.
“There is a very large mobilization of the extreme left and of those who want to attack the gendarmes and perhaps kill the gendarmes and kill the institutions,” Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin also estimated this Friday on CNews.
The police are already on the spot
The police, military trucks and helicopters are already deployed in the place this Friday to avoid the mobilization of Saturday. The rally is scheduled for Friday and Sunday.
Mega-basins are water reservoirs for agricultural irrigation. They feed on rain and groundwater. Their opponents believe that they do not encourage changing the water-intensive agricultural model.
Sixteen reservoirs will be built, with a total capacity of about 6 million cubic meters, mainly in Deux-Sèvres.
Source: BFM TV
