Several French left-wing parties will not take part in the new round of consultations announced by President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday, after refusing to nominate his candidate, Lucie Castets, as prime minister, a decision that sparked outrage within the alliance — the one that won the most MPs, which it calls shameful. The Elysée rejected Castets because “a government based solely on the program and parties proposed by the New Popular Front alliance would be immediately censored by all the other groups.”
Socialists and environmentalists expressed their refusal to participate in the consultations on Tuesday, which is in line with the Elysée’s plan not to call on the main force in the progressive New Popular Front coalition, La Francia Insumisa (LFI). “I refuse to be an accomplice in a parody of democracy,” declared the first secretary of the Socialist Party, Olivier Faure, this morning in an interview on the France 2 channel.
“Now he is telling the French that they voted wrongly”
Faure considers that Macron’s refusal to appoint a prime minister from the political bloc that won the most seats in the recent legislative elections represents “a democratic problem”. “What is really happening is that [Macron] What he does not want is for the New Popular Front programme to be implemented, for us to repeal the pension reform of last year,” he added.
The secretary general of the environmentalist party EELV, Marine Tondelier, accused Macron of embarking on “an anti-liberal drift” by refusing to give the keys to government to the political bloc with the most seats in the National Assembly. Tondelier announced that they would call for “mobilizations” of protest, although he stressed that they would be “peaceful,” according to what he told public radio FranceInfo.
Castets herself acknowledges a feeling of “anger” because the president called early elections “without consultation, which no one understood”, and more than a month later “he tells the French that it was useless, that they voted wrongly”, as FranceInter radio put it.
The Elysée announced late Monday afternoon that after the end of political consultations with the leaders of the main parliamentary parties, Macron would not appoint Castets and would resume meetings with the parties.
Sources at the Elysée Palace have specified that neither LFI nor the far right of Marine Le Pen and her allies – considered by the president to be outside the Republican arc – are invited to the new round.
One of Macron’s main allies, the leader of the centrist MoDem party, François Bayrou, assured that the current situation “is not a complete blockade”. Bayrou justifies Macron’s refusal of a left-wing prime minister by the fact that, according to the presidential camp, the program of the New Popular Front coalition is in reality that of La France Insoumise.
The Elysée believes that “stability advises against” an NFP government
The Elysée assured that “a government based solely on the program and parties proposed by the alliance with the most deputies, the New Popular Front, would be immediately censored by all other groups.” “The institutional stability of our country advises against adopting this option,” it said in a statement. The text also specifies that Macron is opening a new cycle of dialogue with “party leaders and personalities who stand out for their experience in the service of the State.”
This rejection is due to the fact that the NFP “did not propose avenues of cooperation with other political forces”, as other political formations have done, the Elysée specifies, including the groups which make up Macronism.
Without additional support, the 193 deputies that the NFP has had since the early parliamentary elections at the beginning of the summer would not be enough to defeat possible motions of censure, since they are very far from the absolute majority of 289 seats in the National Assembly.
