Negotiations suspended between the CMI group of Daniel Kretinsky and Pierre-Edouard Stérin

Interruption of the buyout process. CMI France and Pierre-Edouard Stérin “have mutually decided to suspend their discussions on the sale of Marianne”the press group of Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky announced to AFP on Friday June 28. “They will meet again on July 21 to decide definitively on the fate of these discussions.”specified CMI France on the first day of a strike, renewable for 24 hours, by the editorial staff of the magazine against a sale to the French billionaire due to its possible links with the National Rally (RN) put forward in an article in the World.

“What appeared to be an individual ideological commitment turns out to be a partisan enterprise”the Society of Marianne Editors (SRM) said in a statement on Thursday. It asked the current shareholder, the CMI group of Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky, to “to seek new buyers capable of ensuring the editorial independence of Marianne and the economic sustainability of the title”.

The editorial team thus made an about-face compared to a first vote taken before the article in World. On June 21, it had decided by 60.3% not to oppose the purchase of the title by Pierre-Edouard Stérin, in exclusive negotiations since mid-May with CMI France. During this first vote, the editorial staff considered that it had obtained progress on “guarantees of independence” proposed by the conservative and economically liberal Catholic billionaire.

In the buyer’s project, the former minister and entrepreneur, Arnaud Montebourg, was expected to chair the future board of directors of the weekly. His left-wing sovereignist profile seemed to correspond to the editorial line of Mariannewhose editorial director is Natacha Polony.