(Paris) Less than a month after its birth, the government of Gabriel Attal is already weakened by the political differences expressed by François Bayrou, the historic ally of Emmanuel Macron who distances himself in an unprecedented way from the president and scratches the Prime Minister.
“Drift”, “managerial technocracy”, “crisis”, absence of “deep agreement”: since Wednesday evening, the president of the MoDem has been multiplying thunderous words against the executive duo. After 48 hours of intense negotiations, he thus marked his refusal to enter the government at a time when its full composition must be announced.
“There is a lot of misunderstanding at the Élysée and Matignon. We didn’t expect it,” admits an advisor to the executive, assuring that a “place was reserved for him” after his judicial acquittal pronounced on Monday.
For Benjamin Morel, lecturer in public law, “this weakens the government because the fault lines within the majority will widen”. Even if the MoDem remains in government at this stage, it gives the feeling of having “very much wanted to get out”, at the risk of undermining the “authority” of the Prime Minister, he told AFP.
François Bayrou immediately questioned the “experience” of the youngest head of government in the history of the Republic, and criticized the right-wing of the executive. From now on, he criticizes the “technocratic” vision of Gabriel Attal, particularly on education, supposed to be his priority project and where he boasts of having forged his “method”.
Disconnection trial
Four months before the European elections where the National Rally is favored in the polls, the centrist leader puts a grain of sand in the enthusiasm which has until now surrounded, internally, the first steps of the Prime Minister.
Worse, the one who remains High Commissioner for Planning accuses Emmanuel Macron of not having kept the promise to “govern differently”, and implicitly draws up a case of disconnection between “the France which decides at the top” and the one “which fights down “. As a slogan for a possible candidacy for the Élysée in 2027.
“François Bayrou is like Édouard Philippe, he wants to stand out for the presidential election! », summarizes support from the head of state.
After his former prime minister, self-proclaimed “loyal, but free”, here is the president grappling with his main ally who has become a rebel.
“This says a lot about Emmanuel Macron’s second term which is very weakened by the fact that his camp does not have an absolute majority and above all that he no longer has the capacity to represent himself” due to constitutional limits, believes political scientist Pascal Perrineau. “His power is constantly contested outside, we see it in public opinion” with a popularity rating at its lowest, “but also inside his camp where everyone uses their strategy of differentiation to prepare for the aftermath.
However, Macronie did everything on Thursday to minimize the damage. A ministerial advisor mocks “a little ego crisis” from François Bayrou, who would have “broke down a little” and would go “it alone”.
“Shadow theater”
And everyone invokes the press release from MP Jean-Louis Bourlanges, an influential personality in the MoDem, who criticized his boss’s approach. “They don’t seem to all agree,” quips a close friend of the head of state, pretending to want to let the different “sensitivities” “express themselves.”
François Bayrou is, however, much more than “sensitivity”.
The mayor of Pau had put his presidential ambitions on hold in 2017 to support Emmanuel Macron, bringing added credibility to the young candidate whose desire he shared to impose a “central bloc” going beyond the right-left divide. Since then, even in difficult times, the president has always made sure to “treat” his elder Béarnais.
“We know very well what we owe to Bayrou,” slips in an early Macronist, citing this initial rallying and “the weight of the MoDem group in the National Assembly”, where each deputy counts.
“The country is doing badly enough so that we don’t have this shadow play that the French are throwing up,” breathes another executive from the presidential camp, “completely stunned” by the sequence.
But the same person says he “agrees” with the existence of a “form of elitism perceived by the population”, and also criticizes Emmanuel Macron and Gabriel Attal for a reshuffle which has dragged on for almost a month, opening the door to this psychodrama.