'Yellow Vests' show strong presence for 7th consecutive week, protest French media bias

"Yellow Vest" demonstrators have taken to the streets in force for a seventh consecutive week of nationwide rallies in France, heading for mainstream TV stations and protesting "impartial" media coverage.

Several hundred protesters assembled in front of the offices of public national television broadcaster France Televisions and news channel BFM TV in the French capital of Paris on Saturday.

Citing lower protest turnouts compared to earlier Yellow Vest assemblies, many mainstream media outlets have been quick to declare that the movement has faltered, alienating many within the French public.

A viral video had emerged earlier showing protesters turning their backs to a BFM journalist.

“Today, we have agreed among all the Yellow Vests, as you have shown to lack impartiality, to turn our backs on you.”

Beyond Paris, Saturday’s protests saw large crowds convene across France, including the cities of Marseille, Toulouse, Caen, Nantes, Bordeaux, Reims, Narbonne, and Tarbes.

Teargas was used by police to disrupt many of the assemblies.

Images from Rouen showed a French journalist being harassed as police pushed back demonstrations with a heavy cloud of teargas.

‘Protests will pick up in January’

Speaking to the France-based AFP news agency, Murielle, a 55-year-old office worker protesting in Bordeaux, believed that the protests would make a stronger comeback in January.

"We will keep up even if they tell us our numbers are lower. We're passing the New Year holidays, it's going to pick up in January."

Attending a rally in Marseille, Yellow Vest figure Priscillia Ludosky, who had started an anti-fuel-tax petition in May that gained more than a million signatures, stressed that the protests will continue in the upcoming year.

"We want to get our purchasing power back and have a say in the decisions," said Ludosky, adding that government concessions had not been enough and a mechanism for citizen referendums was needed.

Dubbed the “Citizen Initiative Referendum”, this relatively popular Yellow Vest demand calls for a form of direct democracy, giving French citizens the right to determine important policies by popular democratic participation.

Earlier this month, President Emmanuel Macron made a televised speech in a bid to end the protests, announcing the cancellation of a planned fuel-tax increase and offering a rise in the minimum wage, tax relief for pensioners and tax-free overtime for workers.

PressTV-Macron bows to protesters’ demands, offers wage rise

The French president introduces emergency measures, including wage rises and tax exemptions, to appease “yellow vest” protesters.

The concessions, however, were rejected by opposition groups and protesters who described Macron's remarks “nonsense,” “a charade,” “a bluff” and “a drop in the ocean.”

Coordinated on social media, the protests have grown into a broad movement against Macron’s perceived elitist policies and governing style, labeling him as the “president of the rich.”

Since the movement began on November 17, ten people have been killed and more than 1,500 have been injured. Fifty of the injury cases were serious. Thousands more have been arrested by security forces.

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