Macron hoping new round of talks can break French government deadlock
Emmanuel Macron is to meet French party and parliamentary leaders this week for negotiations to break the political deadlock over who should form a new government.
France has been led by a caretaker administration since the July general election failed to leave any party with a working majority in the national assembly.
After Macron’s centrist government resigned, the Olympics offered the president a brief window to put domestic politics on hold for what he called a “truce”, but more than a week after the Games closed, critics have accused him of playing for time.
He will hold what presidential aides have described as “a series of exchanges” on Friday to end the stalemate.
“The appointment of a prime minister will follow on from these consultations and their conclusions,” the Élysée Palace said, adding that the French people had “expressed a wish for change and broad unity”. It said the president hoped “to continue to move towards the constitution of the broadest and most stable majority possible in the service of the country”.
The New Popular Front (NFP) centrist and leftwing alliance saw off the threat of the far-right National Rally (RN) in the second round of the July legislative election, which left the lower house of parliament divided into three roughly equal blocks.
NFP has put forward Lucie Castets, a 37-year-old economist and director of financial affairs at Paris City Hall, as its choice for prime minister. Macron, who as president has the right to appoint a government leader, has agreed she should be present for the discussions but has already ruled her out for the post.
“The question is not a name. The question is what majority can emerge in the assembly,” he said.
NFP, which gained the most seats in the 577-seat assembly, has said any new prime minister should come from its ranks. After Macron’s rejection of Castets, the hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) has threatened to impeach Macron, a move that is unlikely to succeed and has been described as a distraction by other parties in the leftwing coalition.
The move was rejected by Olivier Faure, the leader of the Socialist party, LFI’s leading coalition partner,
and by the acting interior minister, Gérald Darmanin, who said the attempt at impeachment showed the hard left’s wish to “plunge France into anarchy”.
Manuel Bompard of LFI said impeachment was “a credible possibility”. “But it’s a warning … we would prefer he name Lucie Castets as the head of government,” he added.
Several names have emerged as possible candidates, including the rightwing Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier, the former minister Xavier Bertrand, also from the right, and the former Socialist prime minister Bernard Cazeneuve.
Macron has been counting on riding a feelgood wave following the success of the Paris Games, after a 1 August poll suggested his popularity and that of the caretaker prime minister, Gabriel Attal, had risen by two percentage points.
The French political historian Jean Garrigues said he doubted there would be an Olympic bounce for Macron and that any benefit the president gained would be temporary. “The French tend to credit the success of the Olympic
Games more to the athletes and organisers, such as Tony Estanguet, than to the politicians,” Garrigues told France24.
“This is fairly revealing of the rejection to which the president has been subjected in recent months. We’re in a very tense political climate for which many people hold him responsible. As soon as reality sets in, he will once again find himself at the centre of controversy and tension.”
Macron is under pressure to appoint a new prime minister before the opening of the Paralympic Games on 28 August.