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French President Nicolas Sarkozy's fiercely contested pension reform bill is expected to clear Parliament this week and will probably be adopted as law November 15, a senior adviser to Sarkozy said Sunday. The bill, which increases the minimum retirement age from 60 to 62, was approved by the Senate on Friday and will now be reconciled with a version passed by the lower house before getting the final nod Wednesday. "This reform will pass. It's a victory for France and the French," Raymond Soubie, a social affairs adviser to the president, told Europe 1 radio, noting that recent protests against the reform had failed to paralyze public services and that labor leaders had been "quite reasonable." However, with opinion polls showing the embattled president more unpopular than ever, trade unions and student bodies have declared at least two more days of action. French university students are planning to march today, and trade unions called their campaign's seventh one-day nationwide strike and day of rallies Thursday. A poll by the IFOP institute for the weekly JDD newspaper showed Sarkozy's approval rating had dropped below 30 percent for the first time. To overcome dismal opinion polls and lingering protests, the president aims to start afresh with a new cabinet and a tax overhaul aimed at wooing mainstream center-right voters and bolstering his chances against a more popular left. "Social cohesion is a priority. The new government's mission must be a social revival and trying to rebuild that perspective with the trade unions," said former prime minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, a conservative close to Sarkozy. The president is expected to switch several key ministers in November when he returns from a G20 summit in Seoul, including possibly the prime minister and those in charge of labor, transport, foreign affairs and budget. Agencies |
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