Le Figaro Marseille
On the right, for months, on the Old Port, everyone has been calling for it after the disaster of the last municipal elections in Marseille, where divisions raged to the point that two candidates from the same political family presented themselves there. 'one against the other.
But nothing had really come to materialize this large and difficult project until a dinner held last week.
And against all expectations, the union of the right and the center with a view to the next municipal elections in Marseille was not launched by the headliners, but by young activists little known to the Marseillais.
The latter thus gathered around a meal to mark the creation of a broad movement of the right and the center supposed to go beyond partisan divisions, made up of sympathizers aged under 40.
This political movement, called “A generation for Marseille”, brings together representatives of each Marseille political leader likely to have influence, or even to be a candidate for the next municipal elections, in 2026. On the list of guests, we find pell-mell representatives from the president of the metropolis and the department, Martine Vassal, to the Renaissance deputy Lionel Royer-Perreaut, via an emissary of Christophe Madrolle, regional councilor member of the union of centrists and ecologists or even a close friend of the LR deputy Valérie Boyer.
Young Marseille elected officials were also invited around the table, such as the LR sector mayor of Marseille Marion Bareille or the departmental councilor Marine Pustorino, close to the Marseille Horizons manager, Bruno Gilles.
The movement also aims to be open to non-members from civil society.
It should be noted that the initiative was driven by Sandra Blanchard, close to the Secretary of State and Renaissance regional advisor, Sabrina Agresti-Roubache, and Romain Simmarano, Renaud Muselier's chief of staff in the region, also a member of the executive office of Renaissance.
“I passed through UMP duty on my 18th birthday, October 25, 2004,”
says Sandra Blanchard.
I was also responsible for the young UMP for a long time before being Sabrina Agresti-Roubache's campaign director during the last legislative elections.
Since then, I feel like I have never left my political family.
It has widened, shifted but I don’t have the impression of having moved.”
In Marseille, many heavyweights of the local right rallied during the presidential election Emmanuel Macron, like Renaud Muselier, leaving the once powerful LR federation now bloodless.
Read alsoBy joining Renaissance, Renaud Muselier becomes the party’s first “grand elected official”
A movement for 2026
“We don't recognize ourselves in the term right-wing youth, when we have representatives of ecology in our movement like those of the union of centrists and ecologists who talk to us about projects that are mind-blowing,”
explains Romain Simmarano
.
And that’s what we want!”
“The idea is to bring together as many people as possible around a project, a vision and above all a method
,” explains Sandra Blanchard.
“This desire to bring together is firstly part of a logic of showing that we are capable of working together,”
insists Renaud Muselier’s chief of staff.
“We started to launch workshops, to consult external experts who make up the city on a daily basis
,” continues Sandra Blanchard.
“It is through the conquest of political power that we are able to change things,”
says Romain Simmarano.
We assume we are preparing for 2026 to halt the spiral of decline into which the city has embarked since the Marseille Spring
(name of the left-wing coalition at the head of town hall today, Editor's note)
has led it.
We assume we are scouts in this matter to show that it is possible.”
In the text which records the birth of this movement, published on social networks, the 415 signatories also take a certain distance from their elders, some of whom will appear before the criminal court in September for fraudulent proxies during municipal elections, while others built their political life alongside Jean-Claude Gaudin whose end of mandate was greatly disrupted.
Read alsoMarseille: in turmoil, Gaudin tries to defend his record
No one can tell us: “Look what you are playing, you are the bad guys!”
Romain Simmarano, chief of staff of Renaud Muselier in the region
“With the experience of community presidents, parliamentarians, ministers, business leaders, cultural, associative and sports players engaged like us in the service of Marseille, we are free from any assessment to better outline the prospects”, can
we read in the text.
“It’s reality,”
says Romain Simmarano.
No one can tell us: “Look what you are playing, you are the bad guys!”
And it's an advantage today because it is today one of the last lines of defense for the Marseille Spring.
We cannot dissociate ourselves from the balance sheet.
We're just being factual.
It is useful to create bridges with a new lease of life.
In any case, it won't work if there is only one generation in charge
.
Until now, the union of the right in Marseille had only manifested itself through the complex organization of a dinner in May 2023. This dinner had one goal: to bring together in the same photo widely distributed on social networks all local leaders from the right and the center, whose enmity between some, fueled by the latest campaigns, is public knowledge.
“I would have 500,000 good reasons to be vengeful,”
estimates the head of Horizons, Bruno Gilles, candidate against LR Martine Vassal in 2020.
But I am one of those who have been calling for unity for months, because we must be clear: if we do not start united, we will lose.
And this is the election where we stake our lives: either we win or we have 25 years.”
To “turn the page” on 2020
For Bruno Gilles, this right-wing youth movement is the logical continuation of the May 2023 dinner,
“unthinkable just a few years ago”.
“Today, the creation of this movement is being done by people who have not experienced the conflicts of 2020 or, if they were, understood that we had to turn the page, while the municipal elections are in two years
,” he analyzes.
“I think it is in our interest to have representatives in this association, rather than watching things being done and then there being divisions between the different movements, or at least between the different initiatives,”
adds Laure-Agnès. Caradec, president of the LR federation of Bouches-du-Rhône
.
It must be an ecumenical association.
It would be completely stupid for everyone to create their own youth club!
Everyone's stables are already clearly identified... We will have to ensure that everyone can operate on a common base, a common project and a common head.
The hardest part will be to designate the common head..."
At the beginning of February, the Renaissance deputy for Marseille and municipal councilor Lionel Royer-Perreaut revealed in an interview with
La Provence
his desire to be
“on the starting line”
.
More recently, questioned by
Le Figaro
on the question, Sabrina Agresti-Roubache was evasive - without excluding it - regarding her involvement in the Marseille political game in 2026.