It was to be a program devoted to international crises, the war in Ukraine, energy and the climate. The ace. It took barely thirty minutes of interview on France 2, Tuesday, October 12, for Emmanuel Macron to be caught up in the fuel crisis in France. “This has nothing to do with the war. There were salary debates, and they were delayed, ” the Head of State was annoyed by calling “responsibility” private actors. “We always tend to put the monkey on the shoulder of the government. You can’t replace everyone.”he lambasted, dismissing back to back the management of TotalEnergies which, he said, ” finally “ opened negotiations, and the CGT, which must “allowing the country to function”.
denouncing “a spirit of ease” which would consist in accusing the executive power, the President of the Republic judges that “everyone must be in their place and take all their responsibilities”. The government would therefore not have, he thinks, badly anticipated the shortages which have penalized for more than ten days the French unable to use their vehicles. “No no and no, it’s too easy! (…) We believe in social dialogue”insisted Emmanuel Macron, who had bet on the voluntary redistribution of margins by the oil groups, rather than on a taxation of their windfall profits due to the war in Ukraine.
In these times of uncertainty, the Head of State calls on the French “to stick together” but struggles to outline a solution to break the impasse. The fuel crisis has trapped the government. After two weeks of tension, six of the seven refineries were on strike Wednesday evening. The movement now extends to the maintenance of five nuclear reactors and public transport. The panic is felt. This crisis has turned into a gigantic game of ball-trap between ministers, where everyone blames each other by trying to avoid the bullets.
It all starts on September 27. The CGT announces a strike in the TotalEnergies refineries to obtain wage increases. The next day, that of Le Havre (Seine-Maritime), the largest in France, began to be shut down. But the management of the oil group wants to be reassuring: there will be no disruption of supply, she promises, thanks to stocks that can last between twenty days and a month. The same day, the company announced to pay its shareholders 2.6 billion euros in exceptional dividends, without prompting any reaction from the executive.
You have 76.92% of this article left to read. The following is for subscribers only.