Former Interior Minister Christophe Castaner has been appointed chairman of the board of directors of the French concession company for the road tunnel under Mont Blanc, according to a presidential decree published on Friday November 18 in Official newspaper.
Aged 56, this early macronist succeeds Thierry Repentin, mayor of Chambéry and minister delegate for vocational training and then for European affairs under the mandate of François Hollande, who had held the position since 2017.
Christophe Castaner had already been appointed on Tuesday to the college of qualified personalities of the supervisory board of the large maritime port of Marseille (GPMM), in the same way as the ex-CEO of Orange Stéphane Richard and Laurence Borie Bancel, who is at the head of the Compagnie Nationale du Rhône (CNR).
Autoroutes et tunnel du Mont-Blanc (ATMB) is a company 91.3% owned by the State and local authorities. It holds a concession contract with the French State, which has entrusted it with the maintenance and management of the Autoroute Blanche (A40) and the Route Blanche (RN205) until 2050. Since 2002, ATMB and the Italian Company of the Mont-Blanc Tunnel (SITMB) ensure within a Franco-Italian grouping, the GEIE-TMB, the operation and maintenance of the Mont-Blanc tunnel.
Christophe Castaner was Minister of the Interior from 2018 to 2020, then president of the La République en Marche group in the National Assembly, a position he held until his defeat in the June 2022 legislative elections in his bastion in the Alps. of Haute-Provence.