We calm down and we drink cool at the Elysée.
While the challenge to the pension reform is becoming more radical and leaves the threat of overflows hanging over the day of demonstration on Thursday, Emmanuel Macron is procrastinating.
To discover
LIVE - Pension reform: Emmanuel Macron on TF1 and France 2 Wednesday at 1 p.m.
Pressed from all sides to find a way out of the social and political crisis caused by his reform, the President of the Republic multiplied the meetings on Tuesday.
With his ministers and the leaders of his majority in the morning, with the presidents of the Assembly and the Senate for lunch, with the deputies and senators of his camp in the evening.
Read also“This thing is dead”: behind the scenes of the explosive meeting of the Republicans
After seeing his government narrowly escape censorship on Monday, by nine votes, he assured that he ruled out resorting to each of the scenarios mentioned to get out of the crisis: neither dissolution, nor reshuffle, nor referendum.
According to a participant in one of these meetings, the Head of State asked his troops to make
"within two to three weeks maximum"
" proposals
"
with a view to a
"change of method and reform agenda”
.
With Élisabeth Borne at Matignon, therefore, who hopes to stay there despite calls for resignation launched by the opposition.
Despite the half-word candidacies of some within the presidential majority as well.
"I am determined to continue to bring the necessary transformations to our country with my ministers and to devote all my energy to meeting the expectations of our fellow citizens"
, argued the Prime Minister Monday evening, after the rejection of the motions of censure and just before a meeting with the Head of State.
Which will explain its choices to the French on Wednesday at 1 p.m. during an interview on TF1 and France 2. Time to see if the challenge to the reform increases or ends up subsiding.
On Tuesday, blocking movements multiplied, as did sporadic gatherings, with clashes against the police.
"Democratic Journey"
The Head of State also wants to take the time to let the text continue its
"democratic journey"
to the end.
For the time being, the course is not finished.
Emmanuel Macron still has to promulgate the law, after its control by the Constitutional Council which Elisabeth Borne announced to seize
“directly”
for an examination
“as soon as possible”
.
The left and the National Rally (RN), wanting the text
"to be put in the trash"
, have also filed their appeals.
This does not take into account a busy international agenda for the Head of State, in the days and weeks to come.
Thursday and Friday, he goes to Brussels for a European Council.
At the beginning of next week, he receives the King of England Charles III for his first visit abroad since the beginning of his reign.
The President of the Republic is then absent for a week at the beginning of April for a State visit to China, the first since the Covid crisis.
It will then be time to address the country again, more solemnly this time, to learn the lessons of the pension reform.
“The great lesson of the sequence
is
the implosion of LR
, observes a close friend of the head of state.
There are no more Republicans.
This is the problem for the head of state.
The logic of agreements on a case-by-case basis to pass texts having been shattered on the pension reform, there now only remains the solution of the coalition to hope to continue to govern in the National Assembly.
Read alsoGuillaume Tabard: “A partisan right caught in quicksand”
But with who?
While some in the majority hope that Les Républicains will eventually come to their senses, others, on the other hand, see a dim view of an alliance that would seal the end of “at the same time”.
To all this is added the very strong reluctance of the President of the Republic to react hotly.
Hence his two-step speaking strategy.
Wednesday on television, to give his vision of what has just happened with the pension reform.
It is also a question of trying to renew contact with the unions, in particular with a view to the labor bill expected by this summer.
As for his second intervention, it will aim to learn the lessons of the crisis, once the pressure has subsided, if it does.
It is at this moment that the question of the reorganization will arise again.
The Elysian strategy leaves some skeptical macronists for the time being.
“After the pension reform, the president must be reformed
,” said a Renaissance deputy outside the microphone.
The president must be told that the tricks can no longer work.
The virilist strategy “we are right, we continue”, it is no longer possible.
Power is perceived as hard, hermetic, distant.
Out of the question, however, to let the head of state “chiraquise” himself, however, support certain tenors of the majority.
In an interview with Le
Figaro
, Édouard Philippe warns against the temptation of
"immobility"
and calls for a
"coalition"
with the right and the left outside Nupes to
"stabilize the political game"
.
Last stand
"It will be up to the President of the Republic to formulate clear priorities, in which the French recognize themselves: ecological transition, deindustrialization, school, health", insists the former Prime Minister, eager to "
obtain
results without delay”
.
But, according to him, a dissolution of the National Assembly would risk bringing about a Hemicycle
“even less governable than today”
.
Stunned by the use of 49.3 and the narrow avoidance of government censorship, several members of the Macron camp are calling for a review of the projects on the agenda.
Priority must be given to ecology, to "old age" and to the sharing of profits in business, listed several Renaissance deputies on Tuesday, in a group meeting.
In front of them, the Prime Minister, Elisabeth Borne, assured that she wanted to
"draw all the consequences of what happened"
.
"We will not hesitate to upset our work agendas to give the deputies of the majority more room for action and initiatives"
, she told her troops, taking care to praise their
"solidity"
.
The appeasement operation also applies to the presidential coalition.
Read also Pensions: a motion of censure which fails by nine votes, is it exceptional?
Will bills bear the brunt of the “upheaval” mentioned by the head of government?
The immigration text of the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, must be postponed, or even abandoned, several Renaissance elected officials pleaded on Tuesday before Elisabeth Borne.
A mistake, believe several of their colleagues.
"We are eagerly awaited on this subject by the French
," said their colleague Marie Guévenoux.
The need for appeasement should not lead to falling asleep.
Faced with the RN and LFI which have a clear social project, we must reaffirm ours.
In the meantime, the left is trying to maintain the mobilization of its troops.
In particular, it calls for a shared initiative referendum (RIP), the admissibility of which has yet to be examined by the Constitutional Council.
The Insoumis Alexis Corbière warned, Tuesday on CNews, on the eve of the televised intervention of the Head of State:
“If he redo a kind of 49.3 verbal, that is to say that he returns to TV to say the same thing, "I don't care about your opinion, I impose", Thursday's demonstration will be even stronger.
In any case, Emmanuel Macron has no illusions about the impact of his intervention on mobilization.
For the unions, which have been playing the legitimacy card since the beginning of the conflict, this is the last opportunity to make a show of force before the final adoption of the reform, once passed by the Constitutional Council.
Ready to throw all their might into battle.
A last stand, which can however also result in a shift of the social movement into violence.
This is the great fear of the executive.
