François Ruffin was born in 1975 in the city of Calais in northern France. In 1999 he founded Fakir magazine, “angry with almost all of Christ.” The writings have been denounced on seven occasions by the large companies, which it has won in six of ellas.Tambialso collaborated with France Inter and Le Monde Diplomatique. He is the father of two children aged 5 and 8. He's also a footballer, and he's written the book, "How did football steal us?"

2016 Merci patron! made the documentary we presented on the ARGIA pages: Jocelyne and Serge Klur, an unemployed marriage, will blackmail Bernard Arnault, an oligarchs guilty of his impotence, with the help of Ruffin and other militant workers. The film shows the dark origins of the riches of Arnault, owner of several luxury companies such as Louis Vuitton, Moët-Chandon and Kenzo, and his relentless conduct with the workers.

Although in Spain – including Hego Euskal Herria- there have been few citations, in France 500,000 people have seen in the Merci patron! rooms, it has been a sociological phenomenon and in part triggered in its wake the Nuit Debout movement in March 2016, when thousands of people occupy places at the end of a demonstration that the unions had organized in Paris, as before Occupy Wall. In Euskal Herria, the Gipuzkoa Zutik movement echoed it in its small moment.

With Merci patron! Ruffin won the Caesar Prize – if it is in Spain – and after presenting himself to the medal he made a memorable speech before the chambers: “My film talks about what led a factory to Poland, leaving behind the misery and discomfort of Christ. And as we talk here, the Whirpool factory in Amiens, which produces suit dryers, is suffering the same thing, because they take it to Poland. Fifteen years ago I was in Amiens, took laundry washers to Slovakia, took him to Continental to Romania, to Goodyear Poland… Thirty years ago he spent in furniture, textiles, chemistry, metallurgy and everything. Why always the same after thirty years? Because they take workers and they don’t care about anyone.”

And he continued to look at the spectacle professionals: "If they were actors, brought together with Romanian actors, the problem would arise immediately. There are journalists… When the taxes of journalists are touched, there are debates, opinion papers in the newspapers. But let us imagine it happening to Members, who say that Members are not sufficiently competitive. Each French MEP costs EUR 7,610 per month, while one Polish MEP costs EUR 2,000 per month. But a Bangladeshi MEP costs EUR 164 a month! Imagine that one day you say: ‘Tomorrow we have to relocate Parliament to Warsaw’. Debates in Parliament would be immediate and a proposal for a law would emerge. Forty years ago that is what happens to the workers and no one has made a bill.”

Ruffin ended his speech by asking François Hollande to “move the ass” and ban the sale in France of brands that relocate factories.

Member's salary: EUR 1,181

To celebrate the Caesar prize, he went to visit the desperate workers of Ruffin Whirlpool. There he expressed his political offer to stand as a candidate at the joint platform Picardia Zutik – Picardie Debout – for the Paris Parliament. By then, the trade unionists that Ruffin has found in recent years had already done the clandestine work, obtaining the consensus of both the Left Front of Jean-Luc Mélenchon and the green ecologists.

We are talking about elections to the Basque Parliament. While France and the whole of Europe are looking at the presidential votes, to see whether the nightmare of investigating Marine Le Pen as president will finally be fulfilled... in the meantime many others are preparing for the coming months, that is, as lehendakari, their policies will have to pass through Parliament’s sieve.

What does Ruffin offer? To begin with, he has placed himself in the place of the voter disappointed by the promises of all kinds: “I would certainly like to establish a ‘maximum wage’ as a law. Abolition of European treaties allowing the free movement of goods and capital. End of precarious work. Increase the minimum wage and pensions to EUR 1,500. Sixth week of holidays. I support small businesses and not large ones. Will you believe my promises? Will I have the majority in Parliament? You doubt and reason.” That is why Ruffin has made three concrete commitments.

One: you will leave your seat if 25% of the voters so request. Two: each MEP has a bag of EUR 130,000 a year to help anyone they want (650,000 in five years! ), organise a jury to distribute the money. Three: as today a Member charges EUR 7,100 gross per month (apart from other allowances and extras), Ruffin charges EUR 1,181 per month until the minimum wage rises to EUR 1,500, which is charged in Fakir magazine.

“It is urgent – says Ruffin in the talks – that the left land between the humble people, as in the dwellings in the neighborhoods of the cities. We have to attract those who have abstained from the left, desperate from the Socialists, to regain the votes of Front National, to show that there is another way to show the anger and rejection of this Europe that is not silence or the FN vote.”

Supported by a group of people excited by the candidature of Picardie Debout, Ruffin visits the families of Amiens, Abbeville and the neighbourhoods of the area door-to-door. “As shown in our film, when you have problems at work, or when you are unemployed, it is very easy to resort to racism, to attack those at your fingertips, be they immigrants or beneficiaries of social assistance. We must make ourselves understand again what the real responsibility is: the master. Before it was known, the owner had the palace in front of everyone, his chapel in the cemetery. Today the worker and the patron who spoil it live far away. See Whirlpool, the factory that will soon relocate from Amiens: the workers don’t know who the boss is.”

Ruffin explained to the Whirpool workers: “Jeff Fettig wins what each of us would barely earn in 500 years. And he says that we workers are too expensive!”