Macron Seeks to Recharge French Presidency With Major Reshuffle
(Bloomberg) -- Emmanuel Macron asked his government, including Prime Minister Edouard Philippe, to resign on Friday as the French president seeks a fresh start after a disastrous municipal election last month.
Macron will name a new prime minister on Friday, his office said in a statement. While it isn't yet known who the president will tap, it's likely that Philippe, who recently won a mayoral race, will not be chosen.
Read More: Macron's Party Trounced in Paris Mayoral Race While Greens Surge
Macron, 42, is seeking a new lease of political life. He underestimated the impact of the Yellow Vests, which morphed from a grassroots movement opposed to higher fuel taxes into a nationwide phenomenon that at its peak turned violent. The protesters never went away. Instead, their list of grievances just grew longer.
They now join unions in opposing an overhaul to a pension system made all the more unaffordable by an economy in recession. There is unhappiness with his uneven handling of a pandemic that has caused nearly 30,000 French deaths. His Republic on the Move party was broadly rejected in a June 28 municipal ballot that saw the Green Party gain strongholds throughout the country.
Former Ecology Minister Jean-Louis Borloo, Defense Minister Florence Parly and Foreign Affairs Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian have been eyed as possible successors to Philippe. Jean Castex, the civil servant who oversaw the end of the Covid-19 lockdown, EU Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier and Valerie Pecresse, the conservative president of the Paris region, are also seen as potential candidates.
‘New Path'
Finance minister Bruno Le Maire, who's at the heart of the government's response to the economic crisis born in the wake of the coronavirus epidemic, said he was not interested by the job of prime minister, even though he is among the most popular politicians in France.
Macron has been walking a fine line between promises to overhaul his policies while also standing by commitments to make the nation more friendly to international investors. So far, he's pledged that his government would invest an extra 15 billion euros ($16.9 billion) over the next two years to facilitate the economy's environmental transition.
Macron said in an interview with regional French newspapers on Thursday that the country needed to follow a “new path” based around the economic, social and environmental reconstruction of the country. He added that this would be accompanied by a “new team” in government.
While it's expected that Macron will name a new prime minister on Friday, it could take days to appoint all the other governmental posts.
Philippe, whose popularity has risen during the coronavirus crisis, has been eyed as a possible contender in the next presidential election in 2022. In an Elabe poll published this month, 57% of respondents said Philippe should remain in his post as prime minister.
©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
-
Opinion | India at 38: From Innovation Overperformer to Innovation Powerhouse
India now has 453 VC-backed deep science startups, 18 of them late-stage, after 117 percent growth since 2020. Laurus Labs, at USD 9.3 billion, is the most valuable deep science company in any middle-income economy outside China.
-
Navigating Energy Crossroads: S Jaishankar's Call For Diversified Supply Chains At G20 Ministerial Meeting
As geopolitical fault lines continue to test maritime trade routes and commodity flows, Jaishankar's message remains pertinent: true economic resilience requires open markets, protected transit lines, and a genuine commitment to multilateral cooperation rather than coercion.
-
Indians Are Travelling, But Not Every Journey Is A Holiday | The Week In Whys
Pilgrims, patients and working women are the real travellers, and the system hasn't quite caught up with them.
-
Getting To Work Costs Women More | The Reason Why
It is not just about women paying more than men. It is about women paying much more in cities than in villages.
-
AI Bias In Investing Cannot Be Eliminated, But It Can Be Governed
Framing is a particularly important example as identical financial information presented in terms of gains rather than losses can lead an LLM to reach a different assessment.
-
Joining The Dots | Dark Skies, Steady Diya: Why Hope Holds This Diwali
With war, a weak rupee and foreign outflows weighing on sentiment, policymakers at the NDTV World Summit and market veterans at NDTV Profit Ignite: Diwali Edition offered the same advice: stay invested and filter out the noise.
-
The Curious Case of Equitas Small Finance Bank And A CEO Who Quit For Stock
PN Vasudevan believes persistent investor concerns over a perceived conflict of interest had become a governance overhang on Equitas Small Finance Bank's stock, even as the lender improved profitability and asset quality.
-
Talking Points This Week: AI Cash Burn, A Tiger Comeback And An India That Still Finds Its Own Path
India is not immune to higher oil or tighter global liquidity, yet its earnings base is broader, its domestic policy levers are still available.
-
Foreign Investors Own Half Of HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank. An LTCG Cut Could Matter Most Here
Foreign portfolio investors have US$115 billion parked in HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank. If the government cuts long-term capital gains tax, Jefferies says returning foreign money could land here first.
