Paris all set for ‘crazy week’

Press, 11 July 1989, Page 10

Paris all set for ‘crazy week’

NZPA-Reuter Paris Paris.says “bienvenu” to a torrent' of visitors this week but neither presidents nor paupers should be surprised if the welcome is hissed through gritted teeth. As the brickbats rain down from all sides even President Francois Mitterrand, who was determined to host two mega-events simultaneously, could be suffering from lastminute doubts. Was it foolish pride , or a stroke of genius io insist on making the climax of celebrations of the bicentenary of France’s 1789 Revolution coincide with thte annual summit conference of the world's seven most powerful capitalist countries? The answer will be known at the end of what Parisian newspapers are calling “the crazy week” when President George Bush, 30 other leaders, and armies of tourists have left for home. ; '. Mr Mitterrand, who is admired by 65 per cent of the French in normal times, has rarely if ever been under such heavy fire

from the Right, the Left, the rich; the poof, the clergy,''policemen, taxi-drivers, historians, and hoteliers. At times during the nervy countdown the 72-year-old Socialist President has appeared friendless. “Mitterrand has made an historic mistake,” the singer Renaud said after persuading 20,000 people to brave stormy skies at the week-end to join his “anti-summit” march. “Two hundred years after the first attack on privilege, the privileged of the planet will meet in Paris, do their sums and look for ways to increase their power,” one protest advertisement complained. Leftists like Renaud are disgusted that the birthday party for a revolution which gave the world the motto “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity” could be upstaged by the G 7 gathering of Mr Bush, Mr Mitterrand and the leaders of Japan, West Germany, Britain, Canada and Italy. The conservative opposition, efficient

party-poopers in Paris since the city is a Right-wing stronghold, have sniped for weeks at Mr Mitterrand’s grandiose plans. The double party is further proof of the President’s “megalomania,” said Alain Juppe, a leading conservative. Even “Le Monde,” the respected French daily newspaper which rarely has an unkind ' word for Mr Mitterrand, conceded that the railway worker’s son has a "certain taste for pomp and magnificence.” The Catholic Church is ignoring the celebrations. It prefers to forget a revolution that led in its bloodiest phase to the murders of thousands of priests. Hardliners in the Communist-led C.G.T. trade union, who demonstrated outside Mr Mitterrand’s private residence last week, have promised more disruptive "spectaculars.” . C.G.T. members in the Paris metro are threatening a lightning strike on Friday, the annual holiday marking the storming of the Bastille fortress prison at the beginning of the revolution.