Elisabeth Borne began her first trip overseas on Thursday, to Reunion, where she will stay until Saturday to “understand” and “respond” to the “daily concerns” of the inhabitants, against a backdrop of announced opposition. The Prime Minister’s plane landed at 7:23 a.m. local time in Saint-Denis-de-la-Réunion. The procession left the airport area under an imposing police force, avoiding the few dozen demonstrators, some with saucepans, who were waiting for its arrival.
After laying a wreath at the War memorial in Saint-Denis, the Prime Minister will visit a water transfer project (underground aqueduct) and inaugurate a France Service house in the town of Salazie, in the center of the island, before meeting in the afternoon several elected officials and economic actors. Just before her departure on Wednesday evening, she celebrated in Paris the National Day of Memories of the Slave Trade, Slavery and their Abolition, an issue that remains sensitive overseas.
Between ceremonies and official interviews, sequences dedicated to ecology, housing, employment or agriculture, an intense program awaits the Prime Minister for this three-day visit to the Indian Ocean, which she is making with four ministers Christophe Béchu (Ecological Transition), Marc Fesneau (Agriculture), Olivier Klein (Housing) and Jean-François Carenco (Overseas). “The common thread is really daily life, the concerns of the inhabitants of the island and how we respond to all these concerns”, we explain to Matignon. “You must have noticed that I had a somewhat heavy parliamentary agenda. This is the first time that I can free up enough time” for an overseas visit, Borne explained on the plane.
36% of inhabitants below the poverty line
A stated desire, also, to go into contact with the population in a context of persistent contestation of the pension reform and disturbed official travel. The task promises to be delicate for the head of government in Reunion where the unions and La France insoumise have launched calls for protest, pans in hand, throughout the visit. No ban on demonstrations is envisaged at this stage. “The Prime Minister is coming to meet the people of Reunion”, we insist on rue de Varenne.
Without an absolute majority in the Assembly, weakened by the use of 49.3 on pensions, Elisabeth Borne faces a most uncertain political equation, with a new imposing and changing government roadmap – the executive has changed again timetable on the immigration aspect- and a presidential review clause set for July 14.
It is this roadmap, which extends beyond the “hundred days” decreed by the Head of State, that Borne will present in Reunion. Upstream of an interministerial committee on overseas planned “in the coming weeks”, according to Matignon. In this French department in the Indian Ocean, where according to INSEE, 36% of the inhabitants live below the poverty line and where pensions are the lowest in France, the pension reform has raised strong dissatisfaction. On January 31, 10,000 people responded to the call to demonstrate launched by the local inter-union