News 14-02-08 EN
When democracy is beaten-out
Hundreds of people demonstrated in Versailles on 4th February, in order to protest pacifically against the amendments to the French Constitution which has allowed the Lisbon Treaty to be ratified (and officially adopted on 8th February). “Pacifically” was the motto of this meeting which was made up by mainly left-wing groups, bringing together movements like “Attac”, “Cactus”, and “29Mai”. The ERC participated also in the demonstration to support French citizens, even though the demonstration had been described as a “baroud d’honneur” (when you fight for something without any chance of winning, but you fight anyway for your honour). While MPs signed the amendments to the Constitution, demonstrators symbolically placed gags over their mouths to denounce the French government’s behaviour which was considered to be attacking democratic dialogue. Democratic dialogue is seen as elementary for any French citizen from any political tendency, for such an important topic.
This gesture did not contain any form of violence and it was not disrespectful or harmful towards the close standing policemen. Nevertheless, Denis’ testimony makes us think bitterly about the behaviour of some police representatives during a pacifist gathering like the Versailles demonstration.
This militant environmentalist was indeed unfairly singled out by policemen during the Versailles demonstration. Denis was using a grating of the police van just to stand up on a barrier to see better what was going on, when he was beaten, and blinded with tear-gas by the policemen before being brought to the police station. He remained in custody for 48 hours, in deplorable sanitary conditions, as Denis’ eyes were suffering and he was still hurt from the knocks that he received. His crime? Carrying two “guns” (a Swiss knife and a wood knife!) and supposition that he supported José Beauvais. José Beauvais does indeed have problems with the government for having destroyed many GMO fields, but this was not the topic of the demonstration. Does supporting José Beauvais represent an offense during a pacifist demonstration to obtain a referendum on the Lisbon treaty? We should not forget that Denis was just an environmentalist.
So this day, democracy has been not only “gagged” by the government, but also “knock-out”, as this victim of the arbitrary and unchecked violence of police represents. Did that really happened in the European Union?
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