Meet Jean Lassalle, a deputy for the Pyrénées-Atlantiques (4ème circonscription). On March 7 M. Lassalle commenced une grève de la faim to protest an imagined plant closing in his district by Toyal Europe S.A.S.U. a subsidiary of world group Toyo Aluminium K.K. (Japan).

DEPUTY'S FIVE-WEEK HUNGER STRIKE SCORES JOB PLEDGE

PARIS, April 14, 2006 (AFP) - A French deputy on a five-week hunger strike to prevent the closure of a local factory, called off his campaign Friday after the government won a pledge from the plant's Japanese owners to protect the jobs.

"I have just signed the agreement, so I have decided to end my hunger strike. I'm very happy," Jean Lassalle told AFP from his hospital bed, after he was rushed in an ambulance from the National Assembly buildings in Paris.

Lassalle, 52, of the small centre-right UDF party [Union pour la Démocratie Française], mounted a high-profile campaign against alleged plans by the Tokyo-based Toyo Aluminium company to close down a factory in his constituency in the Pyrenees mountains.

Note that the deflationary and under-dramatic "alleged" has been left out of the AFP lede.*

Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy said Friday he had secured a pledge from the Japanese company that the car-paint factory, which employs some 150 [147] people in the village of Accous, would remain open.

So M. Lassalle has been smoothed down, his imagination cooled, and France has been done a good by a thinned-down spirited public servant. Ah, no.

JAPAN'S TOYO ALUMINIUM ASSAILS FRENCH MP'S HUNGER STRIKE

TOKYO April 17, 2006 (Forbes/AFX) - Toyo Aluminium K.K. assailed a French lawmaker's hunger strike over the company's plans -- which were later dropped -- to build another factory in France as an 'absurdity' that went against economic freedom.

'We believe that MP Jean Lassalle's hunger strike, which rested on his own assumptions based on a misunderstanding, was an absurdity that greatly harmed freedom of enterprise,' Toyo said in a statement to Agence France-Presse.

Lassalle feared Toyo may close its car paint plant that employs 150 people in his town of Accous due to its plans to build a factory 65 kilometers away in Lacq. The company, which denied it was pulling out of Accous, abandoned plans for the new factory under an accord struck after talks with French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy and the Japanese ambassador in Paris.

JEAN LASSALLE : TOYAL RÉPLIQUE
[Jean Lassalle: Toyal Retorts]

April 15, 2006 (LNO) - The Japanese group declares its total loss "of confidence" after the deputy's hunger strike.

Toyal was to buy land in Lacq belonging to the French oil group Total. According to estimates of the Prime Minister, Dominique de Villepin, the investments considered were as high as €25 million [USD $30,600,535]. The State will compensate [Toyal] for "possible overcost for the establishment at Accous of the investments envisaged for Lacq".

If we have read this correctly, the investment to be made by Toyal in Lacq will now be subsidized by the government to be made in Accous.

"The protocol that was signed is a crisis protocol corresponding to an exceptional situation", a representative for the director of Toyal Europe declared. "As a result our shareholder has lost all confidence [a perdu toute confiance] in the country in which it was supposed to develop."

"Put yourself in Japan's place... When you are in a country where you have important social burdens already, with strong regulation, and moreover you have a political culture that defends a buffoon [olibrius**] on a hunger strike, will you invest -- not only in Béarn -- but in France?".

France 2 reports Toyal made its business reason for capitualtion clear:

"The Japanese did not want the name of the company Toyo Aluminium associated with the death of a French deputy."

The report goes on:

The ambassador of Japan in France [Hirabayashi Hiroshi] declared a little later on LCI, that "no negotiation can be carried out with a knife at the throat. ... The French Agency of the investments was very worried about the negative effects of this affair on foreign investments in general and on Japanese investments in particular" he stressed.

So let's recap. Toyal will not invest in Lacq. The Toyal plant in Accous will remain open as it was never slated to close. The government has assumed expenses it wouldn't have had Toyal been left to itself. Toyal and its parent, Toyo Aluminium, have lost all confidence in France. Mr. Hirabayashi is stunng, the Japanese offended, and a good deal of ill-will generated. Foreign investment in France has been spooked. And M. Lassalle has lost over 40 pounds.

That's some constiuency service.

[All emphases added.]

* Lede or lead = "The most important structural element of a story is the lead...which may in fact be all of a story that many people will read."
** M. Lassalle is an old hand at political buffoonery: SINGING MP BAFFLES PARIS PARLIAMENT

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