After letting down his guard many times, on December 13 local time, French President Macron finally announced the appointment of François Bayrou, chairman of the Democratic Movement Party, as the new prime minister to replace former prime minister Michel Barnier who was overthrown by the parliament.
This is the fourth prime minister that France has changed this year. Four prime ministers in a year, it is unimaginable that this happened in a political power.
2024 is a year of disasters for France, and it has gone through four governments. The first term was from female prime minister Elizabeth, who ended on January 9; his successor was the youngest prime minister Attal, who served until early September; after Macron proposed to hold early legislative elections, the oldest prime minister Barnier succeeded as prime minister and was impeached and stepped down in the National Assembly on December 4; at the end of the year, the “evergreen” in the political arena, François Bayrou, was welcomed again.
Bayrou, 73, is an important figure in the French center-right camp. He was born in a peasant family and was a professor of classical literature in his early years.
He has a rich political resume. He has served as the chairman of the Democratic Movement Party, ran for the French presidency three times, and served as Minister of Justice and Minister of Education.
In addition, he has a special identity, that is, Macron’s close political ally.
Macron’s election as president in 2017 was largely due to Bayrou’s contribution. At an important point in the election, Bayrou withdrew from the election that was favorable to him and supported Macron, helping Macron to successfully enter the Elysee Palace.
Macron has never forgotten this favor. After he was elected president, he appointed Bayrou as Minister of Justice. In 2020, Bayrou was appointed as the head of the High Commissioner Program, which was a special position customized for him by Macron.
Bayrou often goes in and out of important occasions of Macron and politicians from various countries, and attends all political dinners held at the Elysee Palace. He is like Macron’s right-hand man.
Pony Ma is a man of talent, but he is not sending Berlusconi to live a good life. Instead, he wants to pass on this hot potato to Berlusconi.
As we all know, in the early French National Assembly elections in July this year, no party in the new parliament succeeded in occupying an absolute majority. The left-wing coalition won 193 seats, the centrists that President Macron relies on won 166 seats, and the far-right party alliance won 142 seats.
The three major camps are far from the 289 seats required to occupy an absolute majority of seats in parliament, which has led to a situation of three-way division of the country, because the completely different political ideas, interests and policy programs cannot reach a consensus on the key issues of specific affairs.
This is “three monks have no water to drink”.
The previous prime minister was impeached and removed from office by both the left and right wings because of the issue of the fiscal budget. It is precisely because the Barnier government did not have time to pass the fiscal budget for next year that Macron said that the “first priority of the new government is the budget”.
It is not easy to be a president with a three-way division of the country, and it is even more difficult to be a prime minister.
Bayrou wants to avoid repeating the same mistakes in this situation. His first task after taking office will be to resume the discussion on the draft budget for 2025, formulate an appropriate budget, and reduce the deficit that has increased significantly in 2024.
At the same time, Bayrou must also balance the relationship between the various political parties and negotiate with them to get them to join the new government, support future legislation, or at least reach an agreement not to be “impeached” and removed from office. But in fact, this road is not easy to walk, and it is even as difficult as climbing to the sky.
Bayrou’s difficulties mainly come from two aspects.
On the one hand, he has to face the fragmented French political arena. Among the four left parties, the extreme left-wing Indomitable France firmly condemned Bayrou’s appointment and vowed to submit a motion of no confidence.
The other three parties also followed suit and condemned, and at the same time they all put forward conditions. As long as Bayrou used 49.3 to force the bill through without a vote like Barnier, they would launch a motion of no confidence, overthrow the government again, and remove the prime minister.
The left-wing party Popular Front even listed Bayrou’s various crimes on social platforms, from manipulating the presidential election to corruption, and vowed to investigate Bayrou as long as he took office. The declaration of war has been issued!
At the same time, as a representative of the French centrists, Bayrou has a complicated relationship with the right wing and is considered a “leftist” by some of the right wing. It can only be said that Bayrou is another middle-of-the-road person like Barrier who is not pleasing to both sides. Originally, Ma Ge wanted Bayrou to balance the left and right factions, but now it seems that he can only be caught in the middle and suffer.
On the other hand, Bayrou himself is not a pure and flawless politician. Bayrou’s own corruption problem is a big thunder that he may repeat the same mistakes.
When Bayrou served as Minister of Justice in 2017, Bayrou was investigated by the Paris prosecutor for defrauding the European Parliament subsidies by fictitious positions and eating empty salaries, which resulted in him being the Minister of Justice for less than two months.
In 2023, Bayrou appeared in court for trial, although Bayrou was acquitted in February this year. However, with the continued appeal by the prosecutor, Bayrou will stand trial again for this case this year.
Bayrou, who faces the same charges as the far-right leader Marine Le Pen, is likely to become the first incumbent prime minister in the history of the Fifth Communist Party to be forced to appear in court due to criminal charges.
Once the verdict is heard in court, no matter what the result is, Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Rally party, who is also accused of the same crime, will inevitably make a fuss about this issue, adding a shadow to the already difficult 2025 budget draft, which will greatly affect the negotiation process of the budget.
So Macron’s choice of his own confidant as prime minister seems to be a big nepotism and meritocracy. In fact, he is pitting his teammates. Old Bay is a tinker found by Ma to take the blame.
Macron once again carried out the doctrine of the mean to the end, and still had a fluke mentality for Bayrou, who was only three months younger than the former prime minister. But in fact, the French people are no longer interested in the centrists. Judging from the election of the National Assembly, the centrists have become a minority.
At the same time, just one day before the election of the new prime minister, as many as 300,000 jobs in France faced pay cuts and layoffs due to continued economic pressure. The three major trade unions of France gathered to mobilize workers to participate in the strike. The General Labor Union said: We plan to put pressure on the “future government” and expect to hold demonstrations in more than 80 provinces. And according to polls, Macron’s approval rating is only 21%.
In this situation, Macron still can’t recognize the reality, and he is engaged in centrists and gray areas, trying to win over the absolute majority of people who don’t know the truth, regardless of the decline of people’s livelihood and economic chaos. But for France today, confusing and muddy means can no longer convince the public and win over public opinion.
On the 13th, the leader of the French far-left “France Unbowed” Melenchon sarcastically said: Four prime ministers a year should actually change the president.
At this moment, France needs a bold and prestigious leader, a leader who can help France promote reforms and budget plans and make France great again. But where is such a person?
Is it an old man in his seventies, a political veteran who is attacked from both sides? Obviously, Macron’s choice of Bayrou was not a wise move.
Of course, this cannot be entirely blamed on Macron. The fundamental reason lies in the increasingly rigid democratic system in France. This false democratic system has fallen into a vicious cycle of one party singing and another taking the stage. When the economic fence was pierced, the myth of Western democracy began to swim naked, and the democratic chaos in France was also an inevitable phenomenon. I just don’t know whether Bayrou will rise from the ashes or repeat the same mistakes and break the record of the shortest-lived prime minister?