It seems the devil is in the details. In the hall of the Parc Chanot, in Marseilles, Fabien Roussel’s campaign teams had placed on the small plastic chairs not these red flags with the French Communist Party logo, but small tricolor flags, and others, multicolored, taking up the candidate’s slogan, “France on happy days” On the giant screen, a huge blue, white and red flag flutters in the imaginary wind. At the podium, not the slightest trace of a tiny Communist Party sticker.
For his first major national meeting of the communist candidate, the demonstration is clear: after a sluggish start to the campaign, Fabien Roussel is playing the enlargement card, in order to continue his momentum. And to do this, the strategy is simple: there is no question of brandishing communism like a banner. “The challenge is to win back left-wing voters who have been disappointed, assumes Ian Brossart, campaign manager for Fabien Roussel. We are in a spirit of conquest, and for this we go well beyond the ranks of the communists. “And to proclaim:” We claim the best of French communism: paid leave, social security. We’re not a branch of something else. »
Objective: conquer the disappointed
Also, at the podium, which sees a succession of personalities not affiliated with the PCF, few are those who will risk even pronouncing the word communism. Surprisingly, the first one to launch… is not a communist. To everyone’s surprise, a certain Sophie Camard indeed opened the meeting, and publicly displayed her support for François Roussel, as a witness to the ability of the presidential candidate to rally. This war prize for the PCF is rather beautiful: the deputy mayor of Marseille, member of the left republic and socialist, is incidentally the deputy of the Marseilles deputy Jean-Luc Mélenchon, ally of yesterday become the competitor of the moment.
To flirt with this electoral disappointment of the left, of which these personalities are the symbol, Fabien Roussel multiplies in his speech the calls of the foot in favor of the “France of the salary and the payslip”, he who claims to be the one who claims to be a candidate “of the people who know the France of the people”. This France of “those who have no other choice, to be able to access the big cities with clean, non-polluting cars”, this France “of families who live to the nearest euro, this middle class who cannot more ”, to whom he offers, pell-mell, a Smic at 1,500 euros net, the free permit for those under 25 or the establishment of a student income from 850 euros.
A “thunderclap” campaign
It is also a question of standing out from its competitors on the left, with clear, even shocking proposals, such as the outright abolition of homework for all schoolchildren, in the name of the fight against inequalities. “We don’t want to open a lukewarm water tap, confided before the meeting Ian Brossart. It is necessary to carry a cash, original speech. If it’s to say the same thing as the others, it’s useless. Defender of the development of nuclear energy, Fabien Roussel drives the point home, claiming that there was “no other choice”. “It’s still serious that I’m the only one to defend this on the left anyway! »
Enough to allow the communist to continue to ride the wave of hype from which he has benefited for a few weeks? Credited with between 3 and 4% of voting intentions in the polls, just behind Jean-Luc Mélenchon, François believes he can quickly reach 5% according to those around him. “Imagine the head of Macron or Pécresse, if they discover next week, at breakfast, a new poll in Le Figaro, with this title: “a spectacular breakthrough by Roussel”: they are going to swallow their croissant crookedly, ironically the communist candidate? And the press will say: “it’s a thunderclap!” But we will say: it’s not a thunderclap, it’s just a patch of blue sky opening up. “The Marseillaise launches… before the inevitable International, which makes the red flags wave that had been brought back, all the same, by the 4,000 militants present.