“We waited a long time to wake up, but we’re here! This Tuesday morning in front of the Chênes site, the banners and slogans chanted in the megaphones detonate. Khaïs, a geography student, recognizes this. In student memory, we had never seen that. For the second time in the space of five days, a blockade of the main building of the University of Cergy (Val-d’Oise), in the Grand Center, was organized.
It was during this weekend that everything accelerated in this university which usually shines with its calm, far from Nanterre or other Tolbiacs. “We organized our first GA, for more than 15 years, which brought together more than 150 students on Thursday,” says Yassine Benyettou, student vice-president of CY Cergy Paris University. If no one remembers the previous mobilizations, it’s because you have to go back to 2006 to see slogans plastered on the walls of the university. Only the oldest teachers, or those who were students at the time, remember it. The young people then demonstrated against the CPE (first job contract). Since then it was dead calm, the students of CY being very little politicized.
Students present for their parents
Why are they apparently joining the social movement that agitates France? For Yassine Benyettou it was the use of 49.3 and the authoritarianism shown by the government that was the trigger. “The students here all come from the suburbs. Some have already been confronted with police violence. They had never gone to a demonstration until now, but last week we were in the front line of the university procession during the Paris demonstration”.
Khaïs was there and put the cover back on Tuesday. “Before, there wasn’t necessarily a representation of the suburbs in Parisian university processions, and I think it’s important that we put ourselves forward. Other students say they fight for their parents. “My father is a builder, he is ill, I don’t see him continuing to work until he is 64,” explains Mouna. “Mine is a landscaper, his health is deteriorating,” worries Amina, a history student.
A mobilization that is gaining momentum
The debate has even begun to invade the classrooms. “Some teachers have taken a stand,” notes Yassine Benyettou. “What is happening with 49.3 was notably discussed with the constitutional law teacher. At the request of the students, the university passed a motion to lift the attendance requirement during the entire mobilization period. This provision allows young people to participate in events without jeopardizing their university year, and also clears those who encounter transport problems.
If the 3rd cycle took a little longer to relax, the educational world has multiplied strike pickets and blockades in Val-d’Oise in recent weeks. Since Monday, the students of the Pissarro high school in Pontoise are hundreds to demonstrate in front of their establishment. The Georges-Sand high schools in Domont, La Tourelle in Sarcelles and Evariste Gallois in Beaumont-sur-Oise were also mobilized on Tuesday.
