October 17 Movement: between 200 and 300 actions expected on Saturday across the country against the high cost of living

Will Saturday October 17 mark the return of the yellow vests? Since the beginning of September, the movement has called for mobilization on this day against the high cost of living. More than 1,000 actions, in various forms, are listed, Thursday October 15, throughout France, on a collaborative map published on the site 17entreprisesgiletjaune.net. Processions are expected in large cities, but also the presence of demonstrators on roundabouts, in front of service stations and supermarkets, a source close to the Interior Ministry confirms to franceinfo. For her part, she estimates that between 200 and 300 actions will take place at the national level.

Jérôme Rodrigues, Priscillia Ludosky, Maxime Nicolle... Emblematic figures of the yellow vest movement that occurred in 2018 and 2019 are also calling for demonstrations on Saturday. The demands concern the increase in the cost of living, and particularly fuel, the freezing of allowances and salaries of civil servants in the draft budget.

The CGT, as well as political parties such as La France insoumise and the French Communist Party have joined this societal movement launched on social networks several weeks ago, specifies the source close to the Ministry of the Interior. According to her, it remains difficult to know whether the call to join the October 17 movement, made Tuesday by youth organizations already mobilized to defend the rights of high school students (High School Union, Student Union, Federation of General Student Associations), will be followed.

In big cities, black blocs risk interfering

In addition to the actions planned, around sixty demonstrations are being structured throughout the national territory, with most of them being declared in the prefecture, estimates the Interior Minister's entourage. Laurent Nuñez brought together the directors general, the police prefect and the intelligence services on Thursday morning to prepare for this day of mobilization. He plans a videoconference with the prefects Friday morning on the same subject.

According to the minister's entourage, excesses are anticipated in the Parisian processions and other cities. He believes that the ultra-left movement will seek to degenerate these events. The risk of seeing 50 to 100 individuals from the black blocs interfering in the demonstrations is also mentioned, in large cities such as Nantes, Rennes, Grenoble, Toulouse, Lyon and Grenoble, specifies the source close to the Ministry of the Interior.

At the request of Laurent Nuñez, the police prefect issued a partial ban order to impose a route to Paris, still being negotiated Thursday morning. According to his entourage, the minister also recalled that lasting blockages and excesses, or attempts at exaction, will be the subject of firm and immediate intervention by the police.