France: "France is wounded," prime minister Dominique de Villepin told the National Assembly yesterday. "She does not recognise herself in these devastated streets and neighbourhoods, in this unleashing of hatred and violence that wrecks and kills."
In the hope of stemming the destruction wrought by nearly two weeks of nightly riots, the cabinet yesterday revived the April 1955 law that established a state of emergency during the Algerian war. Interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy met with French prefects late yesterday to choose the zones where a curfew will be enforced from midnight last night for 12 twelve days.
"If circumstances so demand, the government will present . . . a draft law authorising it to prolong this measure," Mr de Villepin said.
The curfew includes "bans or restrictions on the circulation of people or vehicles". Violations are punishable by up to two months in prison, though with French tribunals working until 4am to process the 1,500 people already detained in the riots, it's hard to see how they'll have time for curfew offences.
Prefects may use the law to put people under house arrest and confiscate weapons. They can close public places where gangs gather, and may authorise searches at any time of day or night "for example, in the homes of people who throw projectiles or fire on the forces of order", Mr de Villepin said.
In the debate that followed, the communist deputy Francois Asensi criticised Mr de Villepin. "After 50 years, your government is updating one of the darkest pages of our history: that of a colonial war," he said.
Jean-Marie Colombani, Le Monde's editor-in-chief, made a similar point in a front page editorial. "Digging up the 1955 law is sending the young of the banlieues a message of staggering brutality: 50 years later, France intends to treat them the way it treated their grandparents." But if the state of emergency is the stick with which Mr de Villepin beats the rioters, he also offered the banlieues plenty of carrots: €100 million for the 14,000 associations that the right has starved of funds; appointments for everyone below the age of 25 with an employment councillor within three months; bonuses for those who take jobs; 20,000 "make work" jobs in poor areas; the creation of another 15 tax free zones (there are already 85) to encourage entrepreneurs to hire in the banlieues; a 25 per cent increase in the budget for low income housing; 5,000 jobs for teachers helpers by January; 1,000 "educational success teams". . .
It was important to be lucid, because this was France's "moment of truth", Mr de Villepin said. "What is in question today is the efficacy of our model of integration; a model founded on the individual alone, and not on communities." The prime minister sounded lucid when he said discrimination is a reality encountered by residents of the banlieues when they "look for work, housing or certain types of leisure." (Blacks and Arabs are often refused entry to French nightclubs.) "Today, sending two identical CVs, one with a French name, the other with a foreign name, does not give the same results," he admitted.
But then Mr de Villepin went into denial. "France is not a country like others," he asserted. "She will never accept that citizens live separately, with different chances, with unequal futures."
The country's African and Arab minorities have lived separately, with little opportunity or future, for close to three decades.
The leader of the socialist group, Jean-Marc Ayrault, nearly caused a riot when he criticised Mr Sarkozy.
"Your government, and particularly your minister of the interior, carry heavy responsibilities in this unleashing of passions," he told Mr de Villepin, referring to Mr Sarkozy's comments about "scum" in the banlieues. "But . . . we don't have the right to fan the flames . . . Now you know the cost of manipulating fear." The right-wing benches roared with anger. A half-dozen deputies from Mr Sarkozy's UMP party walked out. The speaker of the National Assembly banged his gavel and threatened to cut television cameras.
Mr Sarkozy took the floor to defend himself. Though his name was booed by the left, applause greeted every tribute to police and firemen. If there had been no bavures - police excesses - it was thanks to his strategy, Mr Sarkozy said.
The crisis of the banlieues seems to be nudging Messrs de Villepin and Sarkozy further right. The prime minister promised to crack down on illegal immigration. Some €30 billion have been invested in the banlieues, Mr de Villepin noted; but French taxpayers "haven't always got our money's worth", Mr Sarkozy grumbled.
Mr de Villepin said security forces never targeted the mosque that was filled with tear gas; Mr Sarkozy said he was outraged by the fire-bombing of two churches. Mr de Villepin said his efforts at improving education in the banlieues did not relieve parents of their responsibilities. "When parents don't exert authority, should they receive welfare benefits?" Mr Sarkozy asked.