Reborn South Africa as a police officer

Chapter 2634 Money can't be spent
Leonard's current situation is actually very embarrassing. He is not as good as de Gaulle in terms of round contribution, and he is not as good as Felix Gouin in terms of approval rating. The key point is that he himself has a negative aura of "the richest man in France", which is very bad.

Leonard himself has always wanted to downplay his aura of wealth and not want it to be noticed.

Leonard's competitors also know this, so the "richest man" has become Leonard's competitors' biggest weapon to attack Leonard.

The destruction of France by the war is obvious to all, everyone is greatly affected, mountains and rivers are broken, wives and children are separated——

Why did other French people suffer from the pain caused by the war, but your Renard's net worth was not affected in any way during the war, but increased several times?
In this question, whether the way of making money is correct is not important anymore, wealth itself is the original sin.

On the whole, Leonard's campaign team suggested that Leonard be low-key and pragmatic, and not focus on publicity, but on economic recovery and reconstruction.

This is also in Leonard's arms.

The reconstruction of the transportation system is not only beneficial to France, but also to Renard himself.

Leonard is a businessman. Whether it is the commodities from southern Africa or the products produced by the factories under Leonard's name, they need to be circulated to create wealth.

The simplest example, if France can have southern Africa, or a developed highway system like Germany, then France's demand for cars will increase many times, and then Renard will become the biggest beneficiary.

During the war, in order to delay the reinforcements of the German army, the Allied forces took the railway as the main target of attack, especially in the southwest region where the fighting was most intense, and more than 80.00% of the damage was caused by the Allied bombing.

"Is it because we don't want the railway to resume operation? Not at all, we don't have a railway now!" Leonard has nowhere to avenge, and he can only bear the blame.

Although the railway was not ordered to be blown up by Leonard.

However, as the prime minister of the French interim government, it is Renard's unshirkable responsibility to restore railway operations.

The railway workers don't care how difficult it is to repair the railway. If they don't have a job, they have no income. It's all due to Leonard's incompetence.

"Technical personnel from southern Africa are surveying, and the design drawings will not be completed until the end of the year at least. This is only the first step. We still have a lot of work to do. The specific implementation may have to wait until 1947." Henry looked at Rainer De's eyes are slightly complicated.

In 1947, it was actually quite an optimistic forecast to start construction.

The situation in France is different from that in southern Africa.

When the railway was built in southern Africa, there were undeveloped unclaimed wasteland along the coast. The workers were Africans recruited from neighboring countries through human intermediary companies. With the federal government and private railway companies letting go, southern Africa was built to connect the states. It took a full ten years to build the railway network together.

There are many difficulties in building railways in France. Among other things, land acquisition is enough to make people daunting.

"Now is the best opportunity to solve this problem, we can't delay the time." Leonard is ready to face difficulties.

It is not easy to collect land now, and it will be even more difficult to postpone it until the future.

Now that the war is not over, those who fled France before the war have not had time to return to France. In addition to the damage caused by the war, it is not too much to describe the southwestern part of France as empty.

Since the owner is not there, things are easy to handle. You can get on the bus first and then make up for the fare, forming a fait accompli.

In this way, even if the original owner comes back to file a lawsuit with the French government, it has nothing to do with Leonard.

Because most of the prime ministers will have changed by then.

What's more, there is still a huge good news now, that is, there are nearly one million Axis prisoners of war in France.

The attitude of the European Allied Forces towards the Axis prisoners of war is completely different from that of the East Asian Allied Forces and the Russian Army.

The attitude of the East Asian Allied Forces towards prisoners of war cannot be said to be exactly the same as the attitude of the German army towards Russian prisoners of war.

Strictly speaking, there were no prisoners of war in Russia, because most of the prisoners were shot on the spot.

As for the prisoners of war sent to Russia, their identities——

Can't say, can't say.

Back to France.

Most of the Axis prisoners of war in France were not Germans, but servants recruited by Germany.

Even for the German prisoners of war, the French provisional government did not actually retaliate cruelly, but squeezed their labor value as much as possible. This is one of the important reasons why Leonard frantically pushed to rebuild the French transportation system.

Millions of young and strong free laborers, where will they find such good jobs in a few years.

After figuring out this relationship, Henry looked at Leonard again with admiration in his eyes.

These days, there are not many people who can do practical things in a down-to-earth manner.

Especially in an environment like France.

In fact, the reconstruction work has been fruitful now, and this time Leonard came to inspect the reconstruction of Cherbourg.

During the Normandy landing, the U.S. and German troops fought fiercely in Cherbourg. 80.00% of the entire urban area of ​​Cherbourg was destroyed, the port was also mined by the German army, and there were sunken ships at the entrance blocking the channel.

After the battle of Cherbourg, the high-level Allied forces ordered to dredge the port of Cherbourg, hoping to resupply the Allied forces landing in France through Cherbourg.

This work was not carried out smoothly, and it was not basically completed until November last year. At that time, the Allied forces had advanced into Belgium, and Cherbourg lost its supply value, and the Allied forces had no choice but to give up.

Of course, the work of the Allied forces is not worthless. At least after the withdrawal of the Allied forces, France was left with Cherbourg, which basically restored its port functions, saving the French Provisional Government a lot of trouble.

The reconstruction of Cherbourg has been underway since last winter, and about 30 Axis prisoners of war have participated in the reconstruction of Cherbourg.

Before the outbreak of the war, Cherbourg was a military fortress. The German army built a solid cement line of defense in Cherbourg, and built dozens of forts around Cherbourg.

These forts and bunkers had been completely destroyed by American artillery during the battle. In the subsequent reconstruction process, the work of cleaning up the ruins occupied most of the reconstruction.

After the rebuilding, Cherbourg's military attributes have been significantly weakened. Of the dozens of forts, only the largest one on the southwest side has been preserved and is going to be transformed into a war museum. All others have been demolished and will be planned as residential areas in the future.

The defense line built by the German army was not wasted. The designers built a ring road on the basis of the defense line. Residential areas were built along both sides of the ring road. The inner ring is the commercial area and the port area. In progress.

The engineering sector in southern Africa uses a lot of construction machinery during the construction process.

What surprised Leonard was that a lot of construction machinery was produced by Rhodesia Heavy Industries and Nyasaland Military Industries. These two well-known military enterprises produced a large amount of heavy equipment, including tanks, for the Allied forces during the war.

Reynard has known about the military-to-civilian transformation in southern Africa a long time ago, and the companies under his name have also undergone similar transformations. It seems that the transformation of military enterprises in southern Africa is progressing faster.

The conversion from military to civilian is easy to say, but it is still very complicated to do. The most direct part is to abandon existing orders, which requires a lot of determination.

The reason why the military-to-civilian conversion of the company under Leonard’s name did not go smoothly has a lot to do with the decisiveness of the southern African company.

When Roque decided to convert the army to civilians, the Allied forces still had a strong demand for weapons and equipment. At this time, the southern African military enterprises contracted orders, and some orders would definitely be transferred to other countries.

The company under Leonard's name is the beneficiary of the order transfer.

U.S. companies with greater earnings.

The greater the return, the greater the risk.

With the input of heavy machinery, the speed of reconstruction has been greatly accelerated, and the reconstruction work has not stopped even in the coldest time of last winter.

Now along the two sides of the ring road, the distinct residential areas have begun to take shape, and there are still large areas of open space reserved between the communities. In the future, parks and green spaces will be built to improve the living environment of residents. Although the design of the houses is still very poor Simple, the prototype is already in place.

More than half of the city's residents are veterans of the Free French Army.

The other half were members of the underground resistance army during the German occupation.

Leonard is definitely no stranger to this situation, because he made this decision.

When de Gaulle was recruiting troops in North Africa, he promised that after the war, members of the Free French Army would be given real French treatment.

Those North Africans who joined the Free French Army had very consistent demands. They did not plan to return to North Africa after the war, and hoped to settle in France. In this way, even if the French government backtracked in the future, they had already received real benefits.

Before the war, Leonard really couldn't find a place to house millions of members of the Free French Army.

Settling down is only the first step, and the next step is to provide them with jobs so that they will not become an unstable factor in France.

Fortunately, in a new city like Cherbourg, the most important thing is job opportunities.

"What I am most worried about now is that when those people who fled abroad before the war return, there will be conflicts between them." Tony Field, the Minister of Social Affairs who accompanied Leonard to Cherbourg, was very worried about his future.

Not only is the prime minister in France a high-risk occupation, but the positions of ministers are also unstable.

The so-called one emperor, one courtier, the resignation of the prime minister is always accompanied by the unemployment of a large number of ministers. On the contrary, the jobs of middle and low-level government employees are more stable.

Because no matter who is the minister, someone has to run errands.

"Those who fled abroad before the war, it's best never to come back." Leonard was cruel, and it would be best for such people to die.

Exile abroad also depends on the situation.

People like de Gaulle and Renard who fled to North Africa to continue fighting should be entitled to enjoy the French war dividend.

As for those who ran away with their families overnight when France was facing a war, Leonard hoped that they would stay abroad forever, and France did not welcome such people to return home.

This is also the attitude of the French Provisional Government.

Think about it, even Renault, which cooperated with the German army during the war, and the provisional government insisted on nationalizing it, not to mention others.

"In that case, our parliament can be dissolved—" Tony Field smiled bitterly, if only this matter could be resolved so easily.

Still the same sentence, when war broke out, only the rich were eligible to run away, and the poor didn't even have the capital to run away, so they could only flee from famine.

The French Parliament is the center of power in France. Members know the progress of the war and the state of the country the most. At the same time, they also have the capital to run away. Even Leonard sent his family to France before the war broke out. Southern Africa, and everyone else as well.

Of course, Leonard's situation is different from other people. Although he sent his family away, he still stayed in North Africa and insisted on fighting the Germans. This is quite rare for a rich man of Leonard's level.

"Sometimes I really feel sad. The great France is managed by such a group of people." Leonard had a lot of opinions on the parliament.

The key is because the current speaker is Felix Gouin.

The relationship between the parliament under the leadership of Felix Gu'an and Leonard can be imagined.

As the prime minister of the interim government, Leonard's first plan after regaining Paris was to resettle veterans.

The plan was then submitted to Parliament, where it was outright rejected.

Even the loan that Leonard got from southern Africa to restore the economy is still parked in the Rand Bank account.

This may sound strange. The provisional government is about to go bankrupt, and the loan obtained after all the hard work has not been spent yet, and it is parked in the bank account. This is a bit strange no matter how you look at it.

Actually it is not surprising.

Leonard has already made arrangements for this money, whether it is used to resettle veterans, or to restore the economy, or to invest in creation, and then to help low-income groups, in short, there are many places to spend money, Only the money is not enough to spend, and it has never been spent.

The interim government costs money and requires parliamentary approval.

So here comes the problem.

The interim government needs to spend too much money, let alone a mere 100 million rand, another billion or even [-] billion is not enough.

After the first version of the plan submitted by Leonard was rejected, the second version of the plan was submitted soon.

This time, instead of focusing on housing veterans, Leonard is focusing on restoring the economy.

Well, veterans are all cannon fodder, and the high-ranking congressmen don't care, regardless of their life or death.

Restoring the economy is related to everyone's life. The French economy has recovered, and the people who benefit the most are the masters of the Congress. This time, the masters of the Congress have no reason to veto it.

The result was beyond Leonard's expectations, and the second version of the plan was still rejected.

For the sake of this matter, Leonard was completely awakened.

It's not that the gentlemen in Congress are insensitive, or that there isn't enough money.

But because it was Leonard who proposed the plan.

Leonard believed that if it was not the interim government that proposed the plan, but Felix Gouin, then it would definitely be passed with a high vote.

(End of this chapter)