ReportageOriginally from the department, Lumir Lapray, 29, legislative candidate, tries to embody a vision of ecology in tune with the lifestyles of rural and peri-urban areas, and to reconcile two cultures that are a priori distant.
“Are you a vegetarian? Because, in Ain, it will not be easy to find a restaurant. » We are not, but if Lumir Lapray asks about it, it is because this diet is common in his entourage, that of young activists in the climate movement. Appointment is made in an Asian restaurant in Meximieux, a small town in the clean center with its real estate agencies, opticians, cafes and bakery. Lumir Lapray asks us to place an order directly for three bo buns (with beef spring rolls) and apologizes for being late when she arrives with her companion, Arthur Joliveau, 35 years old.
We will soon understand that this pace without downtime is the norm for the 29-year-old young woman, who has been constantly running from one point to another in the department since she embarked on a particularly daring project: to be elected deputy. under a label of citizen and ecologist left in the June legislative elections in the second constituency of Ain, “a 96.5% peri-urban territory” in the orbit of Lyon, details Lumir Lapray, who knows his Insee like the back of his hand.
The constituency extends diagonally along the A42 motorway which links Lyon to Geneva, from the gates of the distant Lyon suburbs to the plain of Ain and the foothills of Haut-Bugey. Composite, the territory presents itself to the motorist as a succession of vast cereal fields dotted here and there with housing estates of houses whose four-sloped roofs protrude from walls or plant hedges. It is also a logistics crossroads thanks to its strategic location, which explains why you come across warehouses and trucks as much as cyclists and hunters.
In this department with rural roots but whose economy is geared towards industry, to the point of being the second in France for the share it occupies in total employment, Marine Le Pen came out on top in 2017. , with 25% of the votes in the first round of the presidential election. The voters of the constituency, which has been redistributed several times, have voted with impressive consistency for all shades of the Republican right since the beginning of the 1980s: UDF, RPR, UMP then LR, renewing the outgoing Charles de la Verpillière, who did not does not represent, three times since 2007.
Barbecues, cars and animals
An ecologist in the France of pavilions and barbecues, cars and pets? For many, starting with her own camp, associating this type of space with this political culture is a contradiction in terms, admits the young woman whose existential project consists of “connecting the peri-urban to progressivism”. “The climate movement has understood that it had to get the suburbs on board”she analyzes, citing the example of the Alternatiba movement which, after a first HQ in Xe district of Paris, the Base, opened a house of popular ecology in Bagnolet, in Seine-Saint-Denis. “In comparison, the peri-urban and rural areas are still under the radar of the movement, because of this redneck and conservative image that it unfortunately sends back. Most people in my network are unable to place Ain on a map. » And among environmentalists, whose young first-time candidate hopes to obtain support, there is no rushing for the job.
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