The candidate of La France insoumise in the presidential election Jean-Luc Mélenchon is organizing a meeting in Clermont-Ferrand on Sunday, the opportunity for him to respond to the movement of high school anger, which he supports with all his strength, and to respond to Gabriel Attal who held a meeting in Lyon on Saturday. The founder of LFI will speak around 3 p.m. at the Zénith d'Auvergne in Clermont, the city where his movement held its first national convention in 2017. He intends to address youth, a sector of the population generally less mobilized in elections than the rest of the population, but sensitive to the radical ideas of LFI.
He also came to Auvergne to learn the lessons of History. Extolling the merits of “war of movement”, dear to LFI, the rebellious candidate treated himself on Saturday to a visit to the Gergovie plateau, scene of the victory of the Gauls against the Roman troops of Julius Caesar. Passionate about history and strategy, the four-time presidential candidate was on his third visit to the archaeological museum of the battle, the first military defeat inflicted on Julius Caesar in 52 BC. Almost a ritual for him.
“We must never forget who we are,” philosophized Jean-Luc Mélenchon, in discussion with a museum official. “You have to be yourself. When we are in the war of movement, which is the one that interests me, the movement must not fall apart. You have to make the opponent move and run,” he added while strolling in the autumn cool on this plateau located at an altitude of 750 meters and offering a view of 200 kilometers around. “One week the debt, the other the high school students,” underlines the rebellious tribune. Two recent media dominants, with their share of controversies, at the heart of which was La France insoumise.
The founder of the radical left movement has theorized for a decade that his formation should not practice a war of "position", at the risk of getting bogged down, but should attack the system in place by quickly imposing its themes in the media and dictating the tempo of the campaign.
The “war of movement”. It is also the name given to the military tactics of Julius Caesar, who quickly deployed his troops to exploit the effect of surprise. “Militarily, I admire the Romans more. The Gauls were more disorderly,” admitted to the press the rebellious patriarch who claims to be leading a “square” campaign. In the museum, he cannot help but note: "I really like the Roman formation of the turtle, when everyone is in solidarity with their neighbor." The turtle, the totem animal of Jean-Luc Mélenchon and La France insoumise, known for closing ranks when it comes to confronting controversies. And to win the race against the hare, according to the fable.
“You must not cross onto your opponent’s territory”
But in Gergovia, the Romans made a mistake. They set out on foot to attack this plateau and, weighed down with chain mail, exhausted themselves on the climb. “It’s worse than a primary,” said Jean-Luc Mélenchon a bit mockingly as he listened to the ordeal suffered by Caesar’s legions. A reference to the social democratic primary whose first round is being held this weekend that the former socialist senator refuses to hear about this process. “You must not cross onto your opponent’s territory,” he added, more seriously.
Does the Insoumis feel closer to the Gauls or the Romans? “I can’t decide between the two,” he told the press. “Ten years after the battle, they were Romanized like no one here,” he recalled, in reference to the concept of “Gallic creolization” that he had developed during his visit to Gergovie in the fall of 2022.
The LFI leader was accompanied for the visit by Marianne Maximi, the MP for Clermont-Ferrand. “I come here to Gergovie because the show is magnificent. There are places like that that invade you. The last time I came, it stayed with me for a month,” he explains.
The opportunity also to show the cameras a calm and soothing image, anchored in French tradition, and in slight contrast with the usual style of “sound and fury” of the one who now praises “New France”. “It inspires us to show how beautiful this country is,” he even says. And Jean-Luc Mélenchon takes the opportunity to draw a parallel with one of his tutelary figures, of whom he was minister and from whom he took the nickname “The Old Man”: François Mitterrand. “Mitterrand went to Roche de Solutré, it’s more rustic,” he smiles, referring to the climb that the former socialist president made every year in Burgundy for nearly 50 years.
