The Alpes-Maritimes department has decided to use an unconventional way to encourage participation in the elections, offering a bonus of 50 euros (4.6 thousand rubles) for voting in both rounds, writes the French newspaper 20 Minutes on June 28.
In the village of Saint-Blaise, north of Nice (Alpes-Maritimes department), there was one enthusiast among the locals who decided to put an end to the indifference of his neighbours to any election. He happened to be a co-owner of a small bulk freight transport company. His approach to abstention from voting was simple. He offered a bonus of 50 euros (4.6 thousand rubles) to those employees who voted in the parliamentary elections.
He did not care what the outcome of the vote would be. The main thing was that the voter card contained a mark indicating participation in both rounds of voting. Pascal Biskroma, who ran Courbaisse Transports together with his brother, decided to put an end to the defeatist sentiment of 70 employees.
“The general attitude was: why should I vote? This makes no sense, nothing can be done the way we want it to.”“” he called the typical employee excuses.
According to him, the financial incentive of 50 euros (4.6 thousand rubles) was of great value to some employees and to the majority of French people. And Biskrom did not regret giving up this money to live in a democracy, because the motto “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity” was not just words for him.
As the co-owner of the company pointed out, he had not seen anything detailed from other companies. And the idea itself occurred to him when he thought about the phenomenon of abstention in voting. More recently, on June 9, during the European Parliament elections, the number of non-voters in Saint-Blaise was 45% (48.51% on average in France).
He believes that if he were to simply say a kind word in favour of voting, he would not have much influence on the employees. If all his employees were to vote, his initiative would cost him 3,500 euros (325,000 rubles). But he is nevertheless willing to pay this money, he said.
Source: Rossa Primavera
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