On March 23, at the call of the "friends of the commune 42", took place in Saint-Etienne a demonstration celebrating the town of Paris in 1871. This call was placed and read in terms of the current situation, that is to say from walking to war, reaction, the reactions of the bourgeoisie to the general crisis of imperialism whose weight rests entirely on the shoulders of the people, and mainly in the light of the revolutionary development movement worldwide.
Thus, the call echoed widely, receiving the support and signing of the Revolutionary Youth League (LJR), young revolutionaries (JR), of the Communist Renaissance pole (PRCF), of the Federation Jeunes Insoumis 42, of the LFI deputy of the Loire, of the local section of the French Communist Party, (PCF) of the Libertarian Communist Union, Rebbelion extinction of Libre Pensée, of the SELA Syndicate of Grenoble and Lyon, of the campaign Unitary for the release of Georges Abdallah, of the local section of EELV, friends of the commune of Paris 1871, or of the newspaper La Cause du Peuple and our own media, new era.
From 2 p.m., the red flags, flag of the Universal Republic proclaimed on March 18, 1871, began to flower Place du Peuple, alongside the flags of signatory organizations and some CGT flags. After a speaking of "friends of the commune 42" exposing the importance of this event and rejoicing the broad unit around the call, the procession, bringing together more than 80 participants began to sing slogans taken up by The megaphones disseminated in the demonstration, and by the demonstrators: "the town is immortal, let us leave on the assault of the sky", or even "beware of revenge, when all the poor are getting there".
We have also heard the slogans "Palestine will live, Palestine will defeat", "long live the armed struggle of the Palestinian people" from an intervention by an LJR activist recalling that one cannot speak of the Paris Commune, That is to say of the struggle for the emancipation of the human race, not to mention the glorious national liberation struggle which ignites Palestine and the whole Middle East. The procession has also sung "French state is not our state, all the power to the proletariat", connecting the national and revolutionary liberation struggles around the world in the battle for the power of the proletariat.
The collective "Gaza United" founded by residents of the Montreynaud district, participated in the event and its animation accompanied by a drum and forcefully taking over all the slogans. The demonstrators ended up launching: "Long live the armed struggle of peoples around the world", echoing the "Macron, Macron, we will never make the canons!" [Editor's note: the commune of Paris started when the Parisian proletariat refused to return to the bourgeois army the cannons of which the mound was equipped and which it decided to equip it, endowing the proletariat of An army, the National Guard - Vertebral column of any state].
The words have punctuated the demonstration, recalling the heroism of the communards and the communards, of the Palestinian fighters, and of all those who fight for a new world, rid of imperialism. Rather than celebrating a past date, the demonstration was actually an opportunity to highlight those that the LJR activists call "the sons and daughters of the Immortelle Commune de Paris", that is to say those who These are today on the side of the proletariat and the oppressed peoples around the world. In front of the town hall of Saint-Etienne, close to the prefecture where the town of Saint-Etienne was proclaimed 153 years ago, is sung by the procession the International, the anthem of the workers, accompanied by the slogan "L 'French State is not our state, all the power in the proletariat! ».
The demonstration ends at Cuit Couriot in front of the entrance to the old disused mine. The representative of the "Friends of the Commune 42" announces the end of the demonstration before the mine, symbol of the power of the Stéphanoise working class, which has notably risen during the insurrectional strikes of 1948.
Several speeches follow one another, the LJR, the PRCF and the Gaza United collective, before a moment of exchange between activists of different political and unions, in a friendly and fraternal atmosphere.