“In a sober speech of less than ten minutes, remarkably short for a willingly prolific leader during his first term, Mr. Macron seemed determined to show a new humility and to break with an sometimes brutal style”observe the New York Times.
A break in tone also noted by The eveningwho believes that Saturday’s speech showed a “firm will to show that the second term of the president will not be a continuation of the first”.
The Brussels daily adds that Emmanuel Macron’s speech, “resolutely political for an investiture address, hinted at the program and priorities of the five-year term: reform and repair […]by further involving the intermediate bodies, which were largely neglected during the previous five-year period”.
“Mr Macron has pledged to turn the page on a first term in which the president exercised his authority without seeking political consensus”adds the Wall Street Journal. “This brutal approach allowed Mr. Macron to implement the overhaul of the French economy, but also cost him the left-wing electorate, which he now needs to clinch a majority in the June legislative elections”.
Emmanuel Macron therefore promised a “new method” for its second five-year term, committing to “to govern in consultation with the trade unions and all the representatives of the cultural, economic, social and political sectors”Write the New York Times. And “contrast” with presidential style “vertical” adopted during the first term, “which often seemed to reduce Parliament to the role of extra”.
Neither inertia nor inaction
An analysis shared by The country : “It’s as if [Emmanuel Macron] said to his compatriots: the concentration of all power at the Élysée, the president as monarch, verticality, it’s over; the time for deliberation, social dialogue and horizontality has arrived”.
The Madrid daily believes that the speech also allowed the Head of State “to expose, if not the substance, at least the spirit of the next five years”. Et “unlike what happened with some of his predecessors who had two mandates, he does not want this spirit to be inertia and inaction”. On the contrary, the president wants “act relentlessly”.M. Macron has also “promised ‘to act’ to create a ‘more inclusive’ education system and a health system accessible everywhere’, as well as greater gender equality and a stronger army”reports The Guardian.
The weatherwhich retains a speech “short and intense, under the sign of action, of the refusal of fatality in the face of the crises that accumulate”also notes that 450 people had been invited on Saturday under the golds of the Élysée, “an exceptionally high figure for a second investiture ceremony”. Politicians, college students, caregivers, former presidents, local elected officials, sportsmen: the Élysée wanted to play on diversity and “give clues about new priorities”.
But the New York Times observes that there was in the audience “lots of white men in navy suits and ties, the almost universal product uniform of the nation’s elite schools”. For the American daily, “France still has a long way to go in its quest for greater political diversity”.