France unrest: 200 arrested as protests erupt over PM’s ouster, budget cuts

France deployed some 80,000 police nationwide

France witnessed massive protests on Wednesday with demonstrators blocking roads, clashing with police and setting fire in Paris as well as other cities in anger at the political class and planned budget cuts.

Authorities said that more than 200 people were arrested in the first hours of the planned day of nationwide protests under the “Block Everything” banner.

The demonstrations came on the heels of political turmoil, following Parliament’s ouster of Prime Minister Francois Bayrou in a confidence vote tied to his debt-reduction agenda.

On Tuesday, President Emmanuel Macron appointed his fifth prime minister in less than two years, choosing a close ally, Sebastien Lecornu, which outraged left-wing politicians.

In Paris, firefighters cleared charred debris from a student barricade blocking traffic near a high school. Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said that a bus was set on fire in the western city of Rennes and that damage to a power line blocked trains on a line in the southwest, according to a report by Associated Press. He alleged that protesters were attempting to create “a climate of insurrection.”

The demonstrations, led by a loose left-wing collective are a baptism of fire for Lecornu, 39, a close ally of Macron and defence minister for the past three years.

France deployed some 80,000 police nationwide as protesters in and around Paris built barricades from rubbish bins, blocked schools and roads and pelted police with garbage early in the day.

Macron's decision to name a close ally as prime minister was a "slap in the face", said Florent, a protester in Lyon who gave only his first name. "We need change," he was quoted as saying by AFP.

"It's the same shit, it's the same, it's Macron who's the problem, not the ministers," Fred, a representative for the RATP public transport branch of the CGT union said at a protest in Paris.

"The ministers, it's a problem, but it's more Macron and his way of working, which means he has to go."