2024-09-05 16:38:50
French President Emmanuel Macron appointed former European Commissioner Michel Barnier, 73, as Prime Minister on Thursday, hoping that the experienced professional will manage to lead the country out of political deadlock in the absence of a majority in the Assembly.
After sixty days of uncertainty following the legislative elections of July, which resulted in a very divided National Assembly, the oldest Prime Minister of the Fifth Republic – the political regime in power in France since 1958 – thus succeeding to the position of head of state. to Gabriel Attal, 35, who is the youngest.
A right-wing politician with strong experience in France and Brussels, Michel Barnier is known for being a good mediator: he was the EU negotiator when the United Kingdom left the bloc. Before that, he served as minister several times since 1993, mainly under the presidents of Jacques Chirac and Nicolas Sarkozy.
Emmanuel Macron “charged him with the formation of a coalition government”, and “the assurance that the Prime Minister and the future government will bring together positions to remain as stable as possible and give themselves the opportunity to unite widely as it done”, announced the President.
The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, congratulated Michel Barnier on Thursday on X, saying that he had “the interests of Europe and France at heart”.
The new Prime Minister will have to use all his administrative skills to form a government capable of escaping parliamentary criticism and putting an end to the most serious political crisis of the Fifth Republic.
A task that looks like a mission is impossible, because no viable alliance has emerged so far. The Assembly resulting from the legislative elections of July – meeting after the dissolution of the lower house decided by the Head of State, in the wake of a role of its majority in the European elections – is fragmented into three blocs: left, center right and right dimensions.
His decision drew angry comments from the left, the main force in the Assembly, which questioned the position of the head of government.
Like its other partners in the left-wing New Popular Front (NFP), the socialist party in the Assembly announced that it would criticize Barnier’s government, which “does not have a political right or a democratic right”.
“We are entering a crisis of governance,” said Olivier Faure, the socialist leader of the Liberal Democrats of which Mr Barnier is a member.
– ‘Stolen vote’ –
“The election was stolen from France,” replied the leader of the radical left Jean-Luc Mélenchon. “He is a person who is close to the ranks” of the National Rally (RN), a distant group, he said.
In recent weeks, the RN, which appeared groggy in July from the legislative elections in which it found itself the big winner a month ago after its victory in the European elections in June, seems in fact to have turned into a king.
Republican barrage in the legislative elections that marked the failure of the extreme right, which is in 3rd place after the left and center right, seems only a distant memory.
Thanks to the president’s delays for the position of the head of government, – Emmanuel Macron stands for a President who will not immediately submit to the motion of the information and who will not revise his reforms, in particular of the pensions, which the left is adversary – RN turns itself into the “arbiter of quality”, according to the column of many.
The boss of the RN Marine Le Pen now torpedoed the choice of another LR candidate, the former minister Xavier Bertrand, his historical political enemy in the north of France.
Regarding Michel Barnier, who recommended in 2022 a “moratorium” of 3 to 5 years on immigration, the right wing indicated that he would judge his public policy on the basis of evidence, before deciding on the possible censorship of the government soak.
On the left, Michel Barnier’s opposition to the decriminalization of homosexuality in 1981, when he was a young MP, sparked the debate on Wednesday.
“What a strange message that confronts a country which is looking for every way to unite itself to elect someone who voted against homosexuality,” said Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
“If the RN and NFP want to overthrow the government, they are in the majority,” argued Frédéric Dabi, of the Ifop institute.
The ministers who resigned will for this time be in office to continue to manage the current affairs, while the negotiations with the unions take place, which many predict will be long and difficult.
Time is running out to form a full government, with the 2025 budget to be presented in Parliament by October 1 at the latest.
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