In the midst of a challenge to the pension reform, Edouard Philippe is today meeting the founding congress of his party. Elisabeth Borne is expected at this meeting under the sign of the motto in the former Prime Minister: “Loyal, but free”.
A year and a half after the birth of the political party by Édouard Philippe, Horizons is organizing its first founding congress on Saturday March 25, at the Parc Floral in Paris. However, this congress takes on the air of a stopover, after months of cohabitation at the assembly and weeks of tensions with Renaissance. “Loyal, but free“, thus remains the motto of the former Prime Minister who brings together his troops of local elected officials, as a way of reminding the majority of his importance.
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Because the Horizons group considers itself, for weeks, mistreated by its allies, taking as an example the torpedoing of its bill on minimum sentences. Enough to feed a resentment during the examination of the pension reform. Deputies from the party of Édouard Philippe even hesitated to abstain, when two intended to vote against. “When you don’t treat your allies, there are consequences“, pings a pillar of the third party of the majority. And to add: “The government does not take the measure of its political fragility“.
“All this lacks love”
A tackle addressed in the midst of a “post 49.3” social crisis on pensions, “mismanaged“, according to executives from horizons. The President of the Republic “is inflexible and adds fuel to the fire“, laments a deputy. It takes for a close friend of the former Prime Minister that Emmanuel Macron “go back to wet the shirt to save his five-year term” as in the first with the great debate. “There is a lack of empathy. It’s all out of love“, according to him.
In this context, however, Elisabeth Borne will speak, as a way of calming things down and bringing the troops together, at a time when the executive must find a new method to reform. The Prime Minister must also intervene before Edouard Philippe speaks: “His word is rare, it can only be appreciated“, insists an elected official, when a pillar of the party believes that he “there is a tone to set“. It is necessary, according to him, “set headings, settle into the landscape, deliver messages“. In this hectic sequence, “Édouard Philippe must show that politics are responsible people“, insists a framework of horizons.
With one fear, however: that the protest will disrupt this first show of force in the capital with many trains of elected officials being removed. This territorial network which is, precisely, the base of the party of Édouard Philippe.