The “Bercy dinners”: the press thus baptized a strategy implemented by the man who was Minister of the Economy between 2014 and 2016. These dinners, which helped him to build up a network, particularly in the world of culture, were held in his official apartment, Quai de Bercy. “A quite sensational location“that this”duplex overlooking the Seine and overlooking Notre-Dame“, remembers one of its former occupants, the former Secretary of State for the Budget Christian Eckert. You can even come there by boat from the Place de la Concorde, in a shuttle reserved for ministers. From a private entrance , an elevator takes guests directly to the apartments.
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Discreetly, for two years, Bercy becomes a party. Aperitifs and dinners follow one another, sometimes two in the same evening. How many personalities were invited to these receptions? Host Stéphane Bern, who describes himself as “the new kid” had “the feeling that these were people [le futur président] used to frequent“. Among the names that circulated in the press, the actors Fabrice Luchini, Pierre Arditi, Guillaume Gallienne…
However, “Emmanuel Macron is not at all a socialite, at the base, says journalist Marc Endeweld. It’s not someone who goes out… that’s more Brigitte Macron’s register. (…)“Still very little known to the general public, he needs to gain notoriety in a very few months. A strategy of influence, according to him”relatively thoughtful, on the side of the Macron couple as communicators of the time of Macron“. Supported by his wife, he seduced the Parisian cultural world at a rapid pace. The Macron address book is expanding, the network is being set up quite naturally. The society life of Bercy has borne fruit.
The cost of such a discreet strategy
When Emmanuel Macron resigned on August 31, 2016, the former Secretary of State for the Budget discovered that “all the credits for the year were consumed“. Representation costs, this envelope allocated to the minister and intended for professional invitations, have been siphoned off: 120,000 euros have been spent in eight months, as revealed by Frédéric Says and Marion L’Hour in their book In the hell of Bercy (ed. JC Lattes).
Is receiving actors, singers, authors, autrices directly related to the activity of Minister of the Economy? For Marc Endeweld, “Anyway, it’s a gray area…“Questioned at the time, Emmanuel Macron specified that he had used”80% of credits that [lui] were allocated (…) which make it possible to receive entrepreneurs, women and men of French life“, and assumes these expenses, which are completely legal.
A few months later, Emmanuel Macron officially announced his candidacy for the 2017 election, after torpedoing that of outgoing President François Hollande. “Bercy and the logistical means of a minister from Bercy have obviously served, in part, as a runway for the candidate Macron“, concludes Christian Eckert.
Excerpt from “People and politics, small services between friends?”, a document to see in “Complementary investigation” on February 3, 2022.
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