She is not used to coming to the market so early, but this afternoon is Father’s Day and there will be eleven at the table around Djibril, 83 years old. He lacks fresh coriander for the grated carrot salad and oriental pastries for dessert. “Yes, we are with the family when it is Ramadan, but also for Father’s Day, like you. We are well integrated, right? », laughs Leila Haffas, secretary in a car garage who does not know the crisis.
Electrician in the roubaisienne 8e constituency in the North, she did not hesitate between outgoing MP Catherine Osson, a socialist who joined La République en Marche in the 2017 legislative elections, and the 30-year-old David Guiraud, “national speaker of La France insoumise (LFI)”, as he describes himself. “These people are hurting us” Laments Leila. “He had invited this excited young guy who talks nonsense”, whose name she forgot. She talks about Taha Bouhafs, who was supposed to be a guest at David Guiraud’s first campaign event in Roubaix, but eventually became too cumbersome to star with him. “He says there is no problem with radical Islam here, but we Muslims are the first to be bothered with these people,” says Leila, who “vote Macron because he wants to do something against bearded men”. She does not know the deputy Together!, who came in second position at the end of the first round (24.16% against 39.83 for David Guiraud), but “no question of voting for a candidate of Mélenchon, and at home, we all vote the same”.
A few hundred meters from this large popular market, in the privileged district of one of the poorest towns in France, Ghislaine and Jean-Pierre are walking their dog in Barbieux Park. These two retirees live in a residence with a view of the tall trees. “It bothered me a little to vote for a former socialist, but since Fillon was beaten, we made up our minds”, says Jean-Pierre, who was a family doctor and “finds that the president is not doing so badly”. With his wife, he travels a lot since he closed his practice “and, frankly, when you compare France with what you see elsewhere, you don’t want to end up with leftists in power”.
“We are not revolutionaries”
A young couple gets off the tram on the alley lined with beautiful houses, symbols of the time of Roubaix’s splendor, linked to the textile industry. They come from Lille to see the exhibition on Banksy presented in the former bank of France, on the occasion of the URBX festival, which animates Roubaix from June 16 to 26. Stéphane Montcourt is a manager at the headquarters of a distribution company that he prefers not to mention, his partner is a midwife at the Lille University Hospital. “We are not revolutionaries and, frankly, Mélenchon Prime Minister, that would be a nightmare. Macron could not make the reforms that we need”, believes Stéphane, just in his forties and a young father, who “comes from a right-wing family”. Isabelle will also vote for Violette Spillebout, the candidate Together! of the 9e riding where they bought a house two years ago, “but they will really have to do something for the hospital and quickly. It cracks everywhere.”
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