It is a sea serpent of French political life, which dates back more than 40 years. Sacha Houlié, Renaissance deputy for Vienne and brand new chairman of the law commission at the National Assembly, filed yesterday before going on vacation a bill which would allow, if successful, foreigners outside the European Union to vote and to be eligible for municipal elections.
You should know that since the Treaty of Maastricht in 1992, only foreign residents of member countries of the Union can vote and be elected to town halls, without however being able to become mayor or deputy. But not the others, not the non-communities. With this novelty: the British, since Brexit, are now excluded from municipal elections.
Sacha Houlié sees in his approach “a long and beautiful fight”which he intends to carry out when Gérald Darmanin’s immigration bill comes back to school.
This right to vote is an unfulfilled promise of François Mitterrand in 1981. It was proposal number 80 out of the 110 of the socialist candidate, ensuring “the right to vote in municipal elections after five years of presence on French territory.” The president, once elected, retreated facing the right.
Nicolas Sarkozy, then Minister of the Interior in October 2004, advanced on this ground before being barred by his own UMP family, Dominique de Villepin in the lead.
François Hollande relaunched the proposal during his 2012 campaign, before quickly repacking it: part of the public, including on the left, seeing in this right to vote for foreigners outside the European Union the door open to communitarianism.
It is the same debate that starts again today, with identical arguments, to the comma. Jordan Bardella, the interim president of the RN, denounced on Tuesday August 9 a “final dispossession of the French from their country”when Gérald Darmanin “waves media over failed deportation” of Imam Iquioussen.
Sacha Houlié talks about enriching France’s integration model. The initiative of the Macronist deputy for Vienne, who says he has submitted his proposal “personally”, comes as a counterpoint to the security discourse of the Minister of the Interior. Emmanuel Macron can thus speak on his left while holding a muscular speech in the direction of those who on the right accuse him of nourishing communitarianism, essentially Muslim.
The debate on immigration will undoubtedly draw the limits of this “at the same time” on a subject which, historically, divides French society.