“The office of what? To do what ? “: in Roubaix, the disinterest of some voters for the ballot
Four times a week, Hamid Taleb goes to the markets in the Lille area. He sells fruits and vegetables. Today, he boasts of his beautiful apricots, which he has trouble selling. Maybe too expensive for the Epeule market in Roubaix. The crowd arrived later than usual. Hamid wants to believe that “It’s probably because people went to vote”. However, in this working-class district of Roubaix, people have not rushed to the polling stations for a long time. This saddens this merchant, who finds that “To make things happen, you have to go! ». Hamid Taleb will vote after the market, in the neighboring town of Tourcoing, where he lives. On the market “it talks a lot and it often discusses politics, yet people don’t vote. Go figure…”. He, as a good trader, he “cause with everyone, even if the extremes are not [son] dada ». He thinks that “the climate has deteriorated a lot, but we no longer have the personalities of yesteryear either”. The personalities? “Chirac! I don’t remember him ever getting a tomato. There, the stories of whipped cream, the eggs… it’s starting to fall very low! » The time for the end of the market is approaching. In the rue de l’Epeule, the terraces are crowded.
“The office of what? To do what ? »
Of the six traders questioned in the main street of the Epeule district, in Roubaix, none can say where the polling station for the legislative elections is. A shoe saleswoman chats with a customer on the doorstep. She hasn’t voted for a long time. In front of the Portuguese café, with its bright blue window, young people offer to look on the Internet. In Phnom Penh, a Cambodian food store, the manager looks at us with wide eyes. He doesn’t know either. Two urban mediators, in fluorescent vests, lean on the barrier blocking the street on this market morning. “The office of what? To do what ? » You have to go to an old cafe for the boss to call the grocer across the street who knows where the school in the neighborhood is located where the Epeule polling station is located. We are right next to a palisade where faded presidential posters proclaim that we must vote for Jean-Luc Mélenchon. This is what the city of Roubaix did – the highest score for the Lille metropolis in the first round, before falling back on Emmanuel Macron in the second, much less widely.
“I have been holding the polling stations for forty years, that has changed a lot! »
At the Lakanal school, a superb building from the beginning of the 20th centurye century located near the city center of Roubaix, there are three polling stations, but it’s a bit of a desert at the very beginning of the afternoon. In the polling station 175, 1,092 registered and 140 voters only since this morning. The municipal employee who makes the report in the evening and transmits the results to the town hall predicts that, “at best, if we have 300 voters, it will be miraculous”. For forty years, she has worked every election Sunday: “I like the atmosphere, but it has changed a lot! » Not easy to find assessors to run polling stations here. “Before, we had too many people…” This evening “If we manage to make two tables, it will be the end of the world”. Yasmina Khiter volunteered. She saw the call on Facebook. The first time was for the presidential election. They called me back for today. In the neighboring office, installed in the school canteen, the district mayor, Eric Delbeke, will have no trouble finding volunteers to strip. “When you are involved in community life, you make a few phone calls and it’s good”. For the moment, he is a little bored: “It is only for the presidential election that it votes, in Roubaix…”
