the race for the presidency is on

2023-05-05 17:49:00

Three candidates have won enough sponsorships to claim the succession of Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux. Their candidacy will be officially announced on Tuesday.

By Philippine Robert

The new boss of bosses, who will succeed Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux, will be appointed on July 6.
© Gabrielle CEZARD/GIRL / GIRL / Gabrielle CEZARD/GIRL

Published on 05/05/2023 at 5:49 p.m.

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After the warm-up lap, the race for the presidency of Medef will finally be able to begin. The candidates completed their collection of sponsorships on Friday and their file will be studied on Tuesday by the Statutory and Ethics Committee of the Medef for validation. Once this last step has been taken, the official campaign will begin and the new boss of bosses, who will succeed Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux, will be appointed on July 6th.

According to information disclosed by BFM Business, and confirmed by Point, only three of them have passed the first stage: Patrick Martin, the current deputy president of Medef and right arm of Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux, Dominique Carlac’h, vice-president and spokesperson for Medef, and Pierre Brajeux , the delegated president of the French Federation of Security. Guillaume Cairou, president of the Entrepreneurs Club, failed to pass the bar of 150 sponsorships, while Olivier Klotz, president of Medef Alsace, had already thrown in the towel and rallied Pierre Brajeux.

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“Members want to have the president’s cell phone”

Will the battle be close as was the clash between Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux and Alexandre Saubot in 2018? For the moment, the bookmakers are still betting on an easy victory for Patrick Martin. Boss of a family ETI, Martin Belaysoud, specializing in the distribution of products and services for construction and industry, the current number two of Medef and heir to Roux de Bézieux, is the big favorite.

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“It has been around the territorial Medefs and federations for five years and that’s what counts for this election: the members want to have the president’s cell phone and have already patted him on the back”, decrypts a former the House. Patrick Martin has already received the support of a federation of weight, the Union of industries and trades of metallurgy (UIMM), and that “in a personal capacity”, of Olivier Salleron, the boss of the French Federation of the building.

A favorite and two challengers

But he can be wary of Dominique Carlac’h. The former 400-meter champion knows very well that victory can only be achieved in the final straight and is counting on her fine knowledge of the internal mechanics to catch up with the favorite. Director of the consulting firm D & Consultants, she is also part of the stable of Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux and applies the Giscardian method of change in continuity.

The outsider and rugby player Pierre Brajeux, president of Torann, a security company, wants to embody “a change of course”, and places himself in the right line of a Pierre Gattaz and his “Combat Medef”.

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Will these two be able to reverse the situation? Even if the gap still seems significant today between the first in the race and his two challengers, “it is not always the favorite who wins”, slips a senior executive of the Medef, a way of reminding that he does not must not rest on its laurels. The absence of Patrick Martin, who was replaced by Samuel Tual, president of the Medef Pays de la Loire, during a debate organized by the employers’ organization Ethic, was indeed not the best perceived by the members. See you in two months!