The leadership of the PCF’s Nice section has made its choice for the 2020 municipal elections: “Let’s not abandon Nice and the Métropole to Estrosi, Ciotti, and others like Vardon!”
In a statement—see below—it expressed its position: “Less than five months before the municipal deadlines in Nice, the spectacle offered by the left is quite disheartening.”
The decision of EELV to ally with a right-wing ecologist, Jean Marc Governatori, a figure whose background is far removed from struggles for human emancipation, leaves us wondering and illustrates, once again, that the worst in politics is always possible. This decision undermines the attempt at broad unity that we wish to initiate in Nice.
It is clear that between some people’s decisions, others’ calls and intentions, we are cheerfully heading towards a disaster scenario: one where the left would be absent from the second round and thus ultimately from the city council.
A council where the only opposition to Christian Estrosi would be Philippe Vardon and possibly Eric Ciotti is certainly a guarantee of political choices that abandon the working classes, choices that will be marked by an escalation in security and xenophobic delusions and inaction in the face of our environmental deterioration.
Unfortunately, we are already experienced with this type of situation. In the Regional Council with the LR majority, which has already taken very poor measures for the population (Transport, community life…). Another situation is in Cannes, where the absence of any left opposition allows the mayor to give free rein to all excesses. Is it not Cannes where the rate of social housing just dropped from 19 to 17%, and where nearly 50% of the homes are secondary residences to the great satisfaction of the municipality?
We would be irresponsible to let such a situation take hold in Nice. And this is even more so because, on essential points, we can agree. From halting the concreting over of the Var plain to experimenting with free public transport, from fighting urban segregation to implementing a genuine ecological transition, there are numerous points of convergence.
In the face of this new situation of the left’s fragmentation since Saturday, we will persistently try once again to unite what can be united, as was done in Marseille. That is to say: engaged citizens to communists, including the insubordinates, socialists, and ecologists who refuse the alliance with Governatori.
The challenge is considerable, but the urgency of the situation demands that we attempt everything possible. This is the meaning of the appeal we are launching to political forces and engaged citizens, whether they are for or against a broad coalition. We propose that we all meet, together, to explore the possibility that unity prevails to meet the necessity of battles to be fought against Estrosi, Ciotti, Vardon.
