- Title: Meet a French teenager protesting for his parents’ pension
- Date: 26th March 2023
- Summary: PHONE SCREEN
- Embargoed: 9th April 2023 15:00
- Keywords: France family father government pension protest protesting teenager youth
- Location: PARIS & LE PERREUX-SUR-MARNE, FRANCE
- City: PARIS & LE PERREUX-SUR-MARNE, FRANCE
- Country: France
- Topics: Conflicts/War/Peace,Europe,Civil Unrest
- Reuters ID: LVA00A021325032023RP1
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: PLEASE NOTE: THIS VIDEO WAS FIRST PUBLISHED ON SUNDAY, MARCH 26, 2023, AND HAS BEEN RESENT WITHOUT ANY NEW MATERIAL
Every night for the past few weeks, 18-year-old Charles Chauliac takes to the streets of Paris to chant with his fellow demonstrators, in protest against President Emmanuel Macron's controversial pension reforms.
There were violent clashes across the country on Thursday (March 23) evening on the fringes of otherwise peaceful protests that have for weeks gathered huge crowds against a rise in the pension age by two years to 64.
Chauliac, in civic service at a university, lives in the suburbs of Paris with his parents. His father works at the capital's busiest airport, Charles de Gaulles, loading planes.
"My father, he works every day, he gets up to get on the tarmac at Roissy (Charles de Gaulle airport) at 5am to load the planes. I find it difficult to imagine myself at 64 getting up at 3am," Chauliac said.
He is part of groups started by university students to organise unauthorised demonstrations carried out usually in the evenings. While a few protesters have been seen torching bins and throwing rocks at police, Chauliac insists he hasn't.
Opinion polls show a wide majority of voters are opposed to the pension bill. They were further angered by the government's decision to skip the vote in parliament and by Macron comparing some of the protests to the Jan. 6, 2021, storming of the U.S. Capitol.
The latest wave of protests and clashes has become the most serious challenge to Macron's authority since the "Yellow Vest" revolt of disgruntled working class people four years ago.
Chauliac said these demonstrations against pensions reforms are the first he's actively taken part in.
Macron on Friday (March 24) said he would press ahead with reforms, dodging a union leader's call to suspend a new pension law amid some of France's worst street violence in years.
"For young people like me, we grew up with the hope of being able to influence our society. And when we see that decisions are made without consulting the people who make up this society, that takes away the possibility of being able to change things," said Chauliac.
Unions have called for regional action over the weekend and new nationwide strikes and protests on Tuesday (March 28).
(Production: Yonathan Van der Voort, Yiming Woo) - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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