French President Emmanuel Macron has given in to the initial demands of the Gilets Jaunes (Yellow Vest) movement and permanently cancelled the proposed increase tax on fuel after a negative reaction to a six-month deferment.
The Elysée Palace confirmed that the fuel tax hike slated for January, which sparked the Yellow Vest movement, would be cancelled entirely on late Wednesday following a massively negative reaction to Prime Minister Édouard Philippe’s proposal to simply defer the tax for another six months, franceinfo reports.
Clarifying, the palace told franceinfo the increase is not “suspended or deferred,” but “cancelled.”
The Elysée also confirmed the announcement to network France 24.
On Tuesday, representatives of the Yellow Vest movement said the temporary freeze on the tax proposed by the French prime minister was simply not enough. Benjamin Cauchy, a major figure in the movement said, “We will not be put to sleep by a moratorium, the issues are much wider than that,” and added, “the French do not want crumbs, they want the breadstick in full.”
Whether or not the cancellation of the fuel tax will end the protests is unclear as members of the movement have already called for a “fourth act” to take place on Saturday.
Eric Drouet, another spokesman in the movement, said before the announcement from President Macron, “A tax freeze does not change the living conditions in the immediate future.”
“It’s unfortunate but it’s the only way to show that a large part or even the majority of yellow vests do not agree with the measures announced, and it will continue until there is real change,” he added.
The movement has also begun to cite other issues of protest on top of the fuel tax, including the UN migration pact set to be signed in Marrakesh this month. The Yellow Vests have spoken about “replacement” and “chaos” if the pact is signed by the French government with many opposing the agreement.
The concerns echo statements from French writer Renaud Camus, author of the “Great Replacement” theory, who spoke to Breitbart London about the protests and said, “The problem is that the protesters themselves are so far too close to the picture, too much inside it, to realise that their fight is part of the general struggle against global replacementism, Davocracy.”
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