“We must move towards a new Republic,” argues Benoît Payan, who is calling for a constitutional referendum

The left-wing mayor of Marseille is arguing in favour of a parliamentary regime.

In response to the “regime crisis” that France is going through after the early legislative elections which resulted in a National Assembly “cut into three pieces”, On Tuesday July 9, Marseille’s left-wing mayor Benoît Payan called on franceinfo for a constitutional referendum leading to a new Republic. “The President of the Republic must activate Article 11 of the Constitution and we must move towards a new Republic,” he said.

“The Fifth Republic as General de Gaulle dreamed of it is dead, it no longer exists”he said. The reason for this, he said, is: “the five-year term and the inversion of the calendar” which he describes of“fatal errors”. The establishment of the five-year term and “the inversion” of the electoral calendar put in place after the 2000 referendum “deprived French women and men, who love politics, of political debate”, he estimated. “When we deprive a people of what has made up their DNA since the Enlightenment through the revolutions, then we are slowly moving towards a crisis of the regime”he pointed out. “The legislative election is the essence of political debate”stressed the mayor of the Phocaean city who is in favour of a parliamentary regime.

“You will see in the coming months, the situation will become complex, blocked, and if next year, the head of state were to decide to dissolve, it is a safe bet that, to the nearest epsilon, we would be on three blocs,” warned Benoît Payan. For the mayor of Marseille, “we have to change everything”. “It’s not just a question of proportional representation, we need to change everything: the role of the President of the Republic, the role of Parliament, the role of the Chamber.”he explained. “When you are head of state and you see your country like that, you have no other alternative, you go to the French people and you prepare the biggest change in the Republic for 70 years.he continued. We need to change the Republic and we need to do it quickly, well, by talking to everyone”concluded the mayor who manages the second city of France with a united left, the Marseille Spring.