IN AN UNPRECEDENTED ACT DURING PEACETIME, FRENCH PRESIDENT EMMANUEL MACRON SAID CITIZENS COULD LEAVE THEIR HOMES ONLY TO BUY FOOD, GO TO WORK, SEEK MEDICAL CARE OR EXERCISE ON THEIR OWN.

Big firms reeling from fallout may be nationalized

PARIS • France put its 67 million people under lockdown on Tuesday, in an unprecedented act during peacetime, and said it was ready to nationalize big companies suffering from the financial turmoil created by the deepening coronavirus crisis.

Drafting in the army to help transport gravely ill people and ordering border controls, President Emmanuel Macron late on Monday said citizens could leave their homes only to buy food, go to work, seek medical care or get some exercise on their own.

In Paris, police patrolled eerily quiet boulevards, stopping drivers and pedestrians and demanding that they present an interior ministry document justifying their movement. The form can be downloaded on the ministry website and citizens can present an electronic version on their smartphones.

“It’s like the holidays in August,” said flat caretaker Slavjanka Stankovic. “There’s only pigeons and police out there on the Place de la Republique!”

France follows neighbouring Italy and Spain in introducing drastic curbs on public life in response to the coronavirus pandemic. France’s death toll from the coronavirus has reached 148 and a total of 6,600 people have been confirmed infected.

Macron’s government is deploying more than 100,000 police officers nationwide to enforce the restrictions. Those who breach the conditions will be fined, although police were showing leniency in the first hours of the lockdown on Tuesday.

“For now we’re just explaining things. Tomorrow we’ll start fining people,” one riot police officer manning a checkpoint in the upmarket Left Bank district.

Hours before the lockdown took effect, Parisians rushed in large numbers to train stations or took to the roads to escape the capital. Those who stayed behind descended on supermarkets and pharmacies, even though these were due to remain open.

“Better to be there than cooped up in the apartment,” said one pensioner who gave his name only as Jean-yves and said he was fleeing to his country house.

The Paris exodus drew dismay from some in provincial France, where many fear city-dwellers will bring the virus with them and accelerate its spread.

“Parisians are fleeing the city and will infect the provinces, just to be confined in the open air. This exodus is unthinkable, selfish and a ticking time-bomb,” one Twitter user wrote.

Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said France might nationalize big companies reeling from the market fallout.

The lockdown will last at least two weeks, Macron said.