PARIS — Hundreds of thousands of striking workers, students and functionaries paraded through the streets Tuesday in what labor unions described as the beginning of a long-term showdown with President Nicolas Sarkozy.
Air and rail service throughout the country was disrupted by the protests — the fourth in a month.
They were aimed specifically at reversing a new law requiring people to work until age 62 rather than 60 before receiving their retirement pensions. But they also were a platform for broader-based political resentments that have been building among France’s salary earners, many of whom view Sarkozy’s government as callous and too close to big business.
In the souring atmosphere, union leaders declared many of the strikes that on Tuesday nearly crippled the country would continue indefinitely or recur on an irregular schedule. The result could be gas shortages, curtailed rail and air travel, chaos at schools and perhaps even power cuts in France’s main cities, they warned.
“We are going to continue,” vowed Bernard Thibault, secretary general of the General Labor Federation. “The mobilization is not going to stop just because the senators have voted.”
An opinion poll published this week showed Sarkozy with a 31 percent approval rate, down 3 percentage points from last month.
The showing in the poll was consistent with a trend of low ratings in recent months that has the opposition Socialist Party dreaming of the previously unthinkable: a victory in the next presidential election in 2012.
