Tens of thousands of people are expected to protest across France on Saturday, as students, trade unionists and remnants of the Yellow Vest movement join forces to demonstrate against rising inflation and the country's fraying social model.
The first phase of protests began in September 2026 over dilapidating conditions of high schools and absence of teachers from schools in Paris' poor northern suburbs, and quickly morphed into a nationwide movement against inequality, weak public spending and falling standards.
Videos of armored vehicles and military trucks and police personnel deployed on streets are circulating on X.
The eruption of protest in France comes at time when President Emmanuel Macron is in his last leg of presidency, leaving behind a polarised electorate and a fragmented domestic political situation.
Investors ditching French debt, driving borrowing costs to their highest levels in more than two decades, have also underlined the country's long struggle to get its public finances in order.
Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu said on Thursday that authorities fear unrest during the protests. The government blames the hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) for inflaming the protests, an accusation LFI denies.
"This is a moment of fatigue in the country," Lecornu said. "We are in an atmosphere of perma-crisis: wars, inflation, and issues surrounding purchasing power."
Opposition chief Jordan Bardella, whose far-right National Rally leads in the polls ahead of next year's presidential election, said he expected violence.
"I'm extremely concerned," he said during a visit to the Paris car show. "It will be a day of chaos for France," Reuters reported.
The last month protest turned violent, with reported clashes between police and protestor on the streets of Paris. Lecornu called it as most violent protest in decades, over 900 police personal injured and adolescent loosing his hand after picking up stun grenade. The police force faced criticism for resorting to heavy handiness to control the students and teachers protest.
The internal police watchdog is investigating at least two dozen cases of alleged police violence. France suspended the use of stun grenades for the student demonstrations, but Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said they could be used in Saturday's protest and argued to use all types of intermediate weapon to quell the protest, Reuters reported.
Calls on social media for members of past protest movements to join the fray appear to have worked, raising questions about just how large the protests could grow.
The Yellow Vest movement started in 2018 as a protest against taxes on diesel before morphing into an outpouring of anger at high living costs and income inequality. However, things have been largely quiet since Macron agreed to billions of euros in tax cuts.
