Photo: Alain Jocard Pool via Associated Press French President Emmanuel Macron
Stéphanie Lerouge – Agence France-Presse in Paris
Published yesterday at 12:31 Updated yesterday at 12:38
- Europe
None of the scenarios on the table in France for the formation of a government are coming to fruition, 51 days after the dissolution of the National Assembly by President Macron, in a deeply divided country.
Three hypotheses are on the table as the resigning government of Gabriel Attal continues to manage current affairs and the country must present a budget by October 1.
The National Assembly resulting from the legislative elections at the beginning of July is divided into three large blocs: the alliance of the left of the New Popular Front (NFP, 193 deputies), the Macronists (center, 166 deputies) and the far right of the National Rally (RN, 142 deputies). For an elusive majority of 289 seats.
Overview of the (im)possibles, between a left-wing government rejected by the Élysée, a government ranging from the right to the social democrats in which neither the right nor the socialists want to participate, and a “technical” government that would only survive thanks to the hypothetical benevolence of the extreme right.
Exit the NFP hypothesis
After more than 15 days of painful negotiations, the NFP parties (radical left, socialists, communists and environmentalists) agreed on July 23 to bring senior civil servant Lucie Castets to Matignon.
Since then, this 37-year-old woman, unknown to the general public, has not attempted to broaden her base, either towards the center or the left wing of Macronism.
Furthermore, the NFP failed to have its candidate elected to the presidency of the Assembly, defeated by the outgoing Macronist Yaël Braun-Pivet.
From the center to the far right, including the right, all the other parties have indicated that they would censure an NFP government, whose program they consider to be very left-wing, “dangerous”.
Reason given by President Emmanuel Macron to draw the curtain on the Castets hypothesis on Monday, despite protests from left-wing leaders.
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The fiction of a broad coalition
Since the legislative elections, the presidential camp has been arguing for a German-style coalition government that would go from the right to the social democrats, and which would thus have a potential of 301 deputies.
But on the right as on the left, no one wants to be associated too closely with a Macronist party that has been defeated three times at the polls and is very unpopular in the streets.
The Republican right is proposing a form of support without participation in a government. But it refuses to “commit to a vote on the budget or to support or participate in the government,” the head of state noted on Monday.
On the left, support for such a government remains very much in the minority, even if some socialist leaders want to resume discussions with the Macronists.
On Wednesday, the former socialist president-elect François Hollande indicated that he did not believe in an alliance with the center, “inevitably doomed to an impasse.” But this “must not prevent the socialists from supporting everything that can move the country forward.”
A technical government at the mercy of the RN
Last option: a government without a majority in the Assembly, but which would count on the goodwill of the extreme right, the traditional right, or even part of the left.
A Macronist MP thus considers a prime minister “who has experience of Parliament, […] centre-right or centre-left and to whom the Assembly would give a chance” to be “very credible”. He would live with the “sword of Damocles” of a censure of the RN, but “otherwise we do nothing”, he argues, also looking towards the centre-left.
“Do all centre-left MPs by definition censure a government that can commit to taking up some of their ideas ??” he asks.
Politicians are contesting the position of arbiter thus assigned to the RN, beaten in the second round of the legislative elections due to the Republican front drawn up by the left and the Macronists, but having the largest group.
“The Macronist bloc instrumentalizes each other in turn, when it suits them,” says RN MP Thomas Ménagé. “Everyone feels like the election is being stolen from them. The feeling of disgust among the French is very significant,” he told Agence France-Presse.