The social mobilization against the pension reform may be running out of steam to the point of reassuring the presidential camp, the setbacks accumulate, in parallel, in the National Assembly. Faced with opposition still bristling over the use of Article 49, paragraph 3 of the Constitution to have the “mother of reforms” adopted without a vote, the executive suffered several parliamentary setbacks throughout the week. . Signals which come to blur a little more the relations between a weakened executive and a disoriented Parliament in the era of the relative majority.
A few hours before the opinion of the Constitutional Council on the much-contested reform, the latest alert came from the Renaissance presidential group. Four deputies of the microparty of left sensitivity In common, Barbara Pompili (Somme), Cécile Rilhac (Val-d’Oise), Stella Dupont (Maine-et-Loire) and Mireille Clapot (Drôme), have become “related” to the Renaissance group, according to the Official newspaper, Thursday, April 13. Until then full members of the Macronist group of 170 deputies, these elected critics of the pension reform had been seeking, since January, to distance themselves from the presidential formation. “Through this act, we affirm the specificity of the word carried by our party In common while maintaining our belonging to the majority”, defended Mme Pompili.
But for Emmanuel Macron, the hardest blow undoubtedly came on Wednesday with the rejection of his candidate for the head of the Environment and Energy Management Agency (Ademe), Boris Ravignon. The appointment of the Les Républicains (LR) mayor of Charleville-Mézières was rejected within the sustainable development committees of the National Assembly and the Senate by fifty-seven parliamentarians against thirty-two, i.e. more than three-fifths required to oppose an appointment, under Article 13 of the Constitution. This is the first time since the constitutional reform of 2008, which established this procedure, that a candidate proposed by the Elysée has been disavowed by Parliament.
Tension of oppositions
In a first ballot, in December 2022, Mr. Ravignon’s candidacy had been narrowly validated, a majority of parliamentarians having voted against without however reaching the three-fifths quota. The city councilor then became acting president of the agency. But after the renewal of the board of directors of Ademe, on February 14, and the official end of the mandate of his predecessor, Arnaud Leroy, a new vote was necessary in Parliament to reconfirm his appointment. A double ballot in a few months which irritated the opposition.
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