My comrades and I have collected more than the necessary 500 signatures from elected officials in order to run in the presidential election. I will therefore be a candidate.

Gathering these signatures at each presidential election is a challenge. This system was created to eliminate candidates who aren’t chosen by the main political parties accustomed to managing the bourgeoisie’s affairs. It was designed when the right and the left alternated in office. But the traditional right-wing and left-wing parties and their allies have ended up discrediting themselves. The wearing down of these parties has led to the emergence of politicians who, like Macron in 2017, are just as respectful of the system, are boosted by media magnates Bolloré and Bouygues and financed by the big bourgeoisie, but who don’t have a sufficient network of elected officials to endorse them.

Television journalists are outraged by the fact that lesser-known candidates like myself have managed to gather their signatures well before Zemmour, Le Pen or Mélenchon. They would like to see themselves choose the candidates! And Bayrou, a supporter of Macron, dreams of excluding from the election anyone below 10% in the polls!

We were able to overcome this obstacle thanks to the mayors of small towns and their attachment to democracy and political pluralism. They themselves are employees, factory workers, technicians, farmers, teachers or retired workers and belong to the laboring classes. They know what it’s like finding it difficult to make ends meet. They know about the problems engendered by unemployment and poverty. They may not necessarily share my ideas, but they find it legitimate for us to be present in this campaign to address the workers’ vital issues. And in order to get their signatures, we had to make the effort to go out and meet them!

I am running in this election as Lutte ouvrière’s candidate so that bourgeois politicians won’t be the only ones occupying the ground. I am running to allow workers to speak up and express their demands. I am calling on all those who no longer believe in the ongoing electoral comedy or in the false promises that are constantly being broken, to all those who refuse to remain silent or give up. I am calling on those who are appalled by increasingly blatant inequalities and can no longer bear to hear things like “there have always been rich and poor” or “things will never change”. I’m calling on those who refuse to be divided based on their origin, their status or their religion and who are conscious of the fact that they are part of one and the same social class, that of the workers, those who are on the frontline and make society run.

My candidacy aims to unite workers who are aware that their fate depends solely on their capacity to defend themselves against the capitalists around a working-class policy. There is no “good president” for the workers. Once the ballot boxes are put away, we will still be faced with exploitation, low wages, poverty and fast work rates no matter who wins. The class war won’t stop after the presidential election.

My candidacy is a call to fight: there will be no significant progress for the laboring classes or for society in general if we don’t take on bankers, big bosses and the bourgeoisie. It’s a question of changing the balance of power, going on strike and engaging in social confrontation.

Workers have started fighting for wage increases all over the country, in companies like BioMérieux, Dassault, Safran, Hutchinson, Lustucru, RATP and others. They are absolutely right to do so. In order to wrest a monthly minimum wage of 2,000 euros from company owners – which is essential as prices soar – these strikes will have to spread and gain force. By voting for my candidacy, workers will affirm that they are determined to fight for their rights.

It’s their work, their muscles and their brains that produce the hundreds of billions of euros that shareholders hoard, billions that are severely lacking in hospitals, retirement homes and schools. Voting for me as the Lutte ouvrière candidate is a way of affirming that the workers’ interests must come before those of the capitalists. It’s a way of affirming that no one is in a better position than workers to run society because they already make it work.

Capitalism is sinking further into crisis. It is the cause of inflation, unemployment, threats to the climate but also of war, which is already devastating entire countries and getting closer to us. Voting for my candidacy is a way of affirming that we won’t bow down to such an unjust and menacing social order and that we must get ready to overthrow it!

Nathalie Arthaud