In three short articles reporting on her recent interviews, Trotskyist Lutte Ouvrière candidate Nathalie Arthaud attacks Jean-Luc Mélenchon, claiming he is propping up the centrist politics of François Hollande by garnering him the left-wing vote.
Photo: Carol Amar, LP
Article Sources: “Arthaud: Voter Mélenchon, «une autre façon de voter Hollande»”, AFP, 20 minutes.fr (25/03/2012); “Arthaud explique la réussite de Mélenchon”, AFP, Europe1.fr (21/03/2012); “LA QUESTION DE L'INTERNAUTE À… Nathalie Arthaud”, leParisien.fr (23/03/2012).
Arthaud: Voting for Mélenchon is “another way of voting for Hollande”
AFP, 20 minutes.fr (25/03/2012)
Lutte Ouvrière candidate Nathalie Arthaud suggested this Sunday on Canal+ that voting for Mélenchon at the presidential election was “another way of voting for Hollande.”
"The policy of the Front de Gauche is part and parcel of this future left-wing majority, if Hollande is actually elected. We have already seen governments like this. What have they done about redundancies and unemployment? What have they done to improve workers’ incomes? Nothing, ever!" she argued.
According to Nathalie Arthaud, speaking on the programme Dimanche+, what Jean-Luc Mélenchon suggests is “to go to the ballot box, pop in the ballot paper with Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s name on it, and then wait,” even though, “there has never been a supreme saviour for the workers.” The LO candidate suggested that there was a “division of labour” between the PS candidate François Hollande and Jean-Luc Mélenchon. Voting for Mélenchon is “another way of voting for Hollande,” she insisted.
Arthaud explains Mélenchon’s success
AFP, Europe1.fr (21/03/2012)
Nathalie Arthaud, LO’s candidate in the presidential election, considers Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s campaign to be “a success for the Communist Party, which has not gone away” and “a symbol of the rejection of Nicolas Sarkozy’s politics, along with a mistrust of Hollande.”
“In fact, Mélenchon and Hollande are sharing the work [...] because Hollande is reaching to the centre, and acting as a unifier and a potential President. Whereas Mélenchon has taken up a more radical position and is trying to jump on a government bandwagon,” added the candidate for Lutte Ouvrière, speaking on “Questions d’info”, a French television programme broadcast on LCP with interviewers from LCP, France Info, Le Monde and AFP.
“Jean-Luc Mélenchon has never been a communist [...] and since realising that the PS was not following the policy direction he wanted, he has looked to François Mitterrand as a role model,” she went on.
Nathalie Arthaud concluded that if François Hollande won the election on May 6th, “he would have the same politics” as Nicolas Sarkozy.
A reader’s question to... Nathalie Arthaud
Le Parisien (23/03/2012)
“Why don’t you form an alliance with the Front de Gauche?” BENJI, ONLINE READER
Nathalie Arthaud, candidate for Lutte Ouvrière, replies: “Why should we hide behind a Mélenchon candidacy? We are revolutionary communists. Unlike Mélenchon, we think that capitalism has had its day. He is calling for an “uprising of citizens,” but what he means by that is a good left-wing government.
We, on the other hand, say to workers that a change of government will not be enough to fight redundancies, low incomes and small pensions. The workers will have to fight. Everything they have, they’ve had to fight tooth and nail to obtain from their employers with their strikes and demonstrations. Mélenchon models himself on Mitterrand, who never imposed any measures that might have damaged the interests of big business in order to come to the aid of workers. On the contrary, his governments froze salaries, allowed redundancies in the steel industry and glorified the Stock Exchange. There is a division of labour between Mélenchon and Hollande. Hollande is the unifier, the potential president, and Mélenchon is the radical firebrand who will bring all those who mistrust the PS into the future left-wing majority. Because the Front de Gauche will support Hollande, who will put in place the policies imposed on him by big business and bankers.
I personally propose a programme of resistance, whose objectives are essential if we are to change the balance of power between workers and their employers.
Translation: Antoine Heuzé
Editing: Sam Trainor