In Lyon, nothing is decidedly going as planned for Gérard Collomb. He thought he was leading in the first round of the elections for the Lyon Metropolis? Voters relegate it to fourth place. He seals an alliance with the right to save the second round? Here she takes the water from all sides.
Concluded between Gérard Collomb and Laurent Wauquiez and announced in the process, on May 28, the great gathering of LREM in LR intended "to block environmentalists allied to the far left" takes on the appearance of stampede. Criticism, withdrawals, resignation, refusal to merge ... on the Lyon field, as in Paris, the maneuver did not pass.
Stanislas Guerini, the boss of La République en Marche, drew the first by withdrawing from the mayor of Lyon, yet a founding member of macronie, the party's nomination. The JAM (Jeunes avec Macron) followed by removing all of their candidates from the municipal and metropolitan lists of Collomb. "This is an unacceptable agreement! “, Considers their leader, Ambroise Méjean.
"This is not the image I want to give"
No less than six assistants from Gérard Collomb, those who had remained loyal to him in the fratricidal war which has pitted him against David Kimelfeld for more than a year have thrown in the towel. "This is not why I play politics," confides, with sadness, Karine Dognin-Sauze, assistant to the mayor of Lyon responsible for international affairs and who has been with Collomb for two terms. “It's not the image I want to give, it's not a good sequence for the history of Lyon. "
The agreement between Gérard Collomb and Laurent Wauquiez is so difficult to pass that in some of the fourteen constituencies that make up the Metropolis, the lists simply refused to merge. "We must take into account local realities," argues Alexandre Vincendet, mayor of Rillieux-la-Pape and president of the Federation Les Républicains du Rhône, which is one of these rebels. “We cannot ally ourselves with those who form our municipal oppositions! We would risk removing seats from a political majority. ”
In Gérard Collomb's own constituency, the list of outgoing mayor did not merge with that of his new LR allies, who preferred to be erased. And in front of this “unnatural” alliance, Julien Ranc, one of Collomb's top names for the Metropolis, even let go of his mentor to go with all his running mate… to David Kimelfeld.
"Today is already disenchantment ..."
Did the organizers of this rapprochement expect such a slump? "It's the marriage of carp and rabbit, it couldn't work", judges an elected LR who has always been opposed to the project, "it's an agreement that was reached in panic, to save Collomb, on the one hand, and Wauquiez, on the other. It was followed by a phase of euphoria when the deal was made. Today, it's already disenchantment… ”.
“We can redo the calculations in all directions, arithmetically, it does not pass. The Metropolis is lost ”worries a right-wing elected representative of Lyon who is enraged against the president of the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region who, he says,“ has sacrificed Etienne Blanc and the right of Lyon ”. "But why did they get into this business," he repeats over and over, "to save their skins?" "
"What drives Collomb now is hate"
In the ranks of David Kimelfeld, the outgoing president of the Metropolis, who leaves in the second round of metropolitan women without an alliance, we interpret this debacle differently: “What now drives Gérard Collomb is hatred. He was three times mayor of Lyon, three times president of the Metropolis, once minister, and all that currently animates him is to make David Kimelfeld lose, "plague a former supporter of Gérard Collomb who has now joined his rival.
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David Kimelfeld is not far from sharing this analysis. "Gérard Collomb is in duplicity and lies," he accuses, accusing him of having explained talking with him "when we never had an appointment". "Today, he says he has solutions to face the crisis, but he is the only one who did not participate in the metropolitan recovery committee. "
