Presidential: in Toulouse, more than 1,400 people gathered to say “no to the far right” during a concert
A rally under the banner of “The Republic in common” took place this Thursday evening at the call of the regional left to block Marine Le Pen.
“No to the extreme right!” The message is clear, and it is shared en masse on the posters distributed among the crowd present at the call of “La République en commun” this Thursday evening, April 21. In the Bikini room in Toulouse, where a concert was held – with artists such as Cut Killer, Sanseverino, Cyprien… – more than 1,400 people, elected officials, activists, or ordinary citizens, came to show their attachment to the values of the Republic, “which the presence of Marine Le Pen in the second round puts in danger”, underline the organizers.
In the front row dismissed the president of the Occitanie region, Carole Delga, mounted at the front to remind the French that “the second round is not optional and that we must go and vote against the far right by putting a Macron ballot in the ‘urn”. The elected PS insists: “To vote is to act. To abstain is to suffer”. Or, “the Republic needs a plebiscite today, this truth bears no hesitation”.
“We are here, we exist”
At his side this Thursday evening, many personalities from the regional left spoke in the same tone: Georges Méric, president of the Haute-Garonne departmental council, Kader Arif, former minister, Sébastien Vincini, first secretary of the PS31, Michel Weill, president of the departmental council of Tarn-et-Garonne, Pierre Lacaze, departmental secretary of the PCF31, up to Jean-Michel Baylet, also a former minister. “We are all together, and that is already an achievement in itself,” said the CEO of the La Dépêche group, barely joking, to mark the importance of the event which took place on Thursday. “We are here, we exist, we are the children of the Republic”, he insisted, referring to a Republican left which “is tired of leaving behind part of (our) values to block, but that is what What to do”.
On this date of April 21, 20 years to the day after Jean-Marie Le Pen’s accession to the second round, Georges Méric for his part recalled the importance of “defending the Republic in its values of fraternity”, in the face of a frontist candidate who “wants to separate people”.
Intellectuals (Edgar Morin, Pierre Egea…), athletes (Brahim Asloum, Sofiane Oumiha, Yoann Huget…) and artists also answered the call. Like Magyd Cherfi from Toulouse, always at the forefront when it comes to fighting the far right. “Faced with a candidate who surfs on the misery of the desperate, the dam is necessary,” he summarized.