the true nature of François Bayrou

“Because I see life down below more closely, the neighborhoods of Pau, or the village where I was born, I feel more this immense danger: people have the impression of being abused by all those in power, politics, the media…”, he theorized in our columns in February 2024. President of MoDem, three times presidential candidate, former deputy, ex-president of the general council, four years minister, former European deputy and mayor of Pau since 2014 – but in Paris half the time – the rooted Bayrou sees himself as holding the loose thread between the circles of power and the French.

Competitor

“We have experienced defeats since 1989 and the first municipal elections,” explains Jean-Louis Peres, first deputy and right-hand man from Pau. In 2012, he lost the deputy, no longer had tenure… We chose a political niche which is not always easy, but he never gives up! » Buried a hundred times, he is reborn. “He is stubborn and also thinks that we are stronger together, like in rugby,” analyzes Bernard Pontneau, the president of the Section Paloise, a local club, that Bayrou calls three times a week. It is said that his favorite players are the most combative, the warriors, and that he, caricatured for his supposed weakness, is a competitor, passionate about rugby, basketball… And horse racing. “He has that in his skin,” says Béatrice Jouhandeaux, elected in Pau and his friend for sixty years. The centrist prides himself on genetics, rubs shoulders with breeders and attends the races.

His horses roam 18 kilometers away, at his home in Bordères. A village of 700 inhabitants where another Bayrou appears on the list of mayors, wearing a beret. It was Calixte, his father, city councilor from 1945 to 1953. “A scholarly, brilliant peasant, with a teasing humor, like François,” says the Prime Minister's childhood friend, Maurice Buzy-Pucheu, 77, whose we reach the house passing a courtyard of cackleing geese. That of Bayrou adjoins the center of the town. “In the 1960s, she was the only one with a telephone, because her grandparents were grain traders,” adds Maurice. So we were going to make calls to their homes… I was still working on the farm when his father was killed in an accident in 1974. It was horrible. We left to help, to accompany them in a friendly manner, too. François was in Bordeaux, he was going to have the aggregation of letters. He took care of the farm for three years. He had to sell the livestock and grow cereals, mainly corn. »

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A restless teenager but not revolutionary

A relative confides: “Her mother was also a strong woman, who withstood the shock. She impressed him a lot. Very cultured too, allowing children to read at the table. In a peasant family, this is not common, and she passed that on to him. When she was at the end of her life in a nursing home, he was upset. Today, when he goes to a nursing home, it affects him enormously. »

Detour via Nay, a stone's throw from Bordères. It was there that Béatrice Jouhandeaux met him, a boarder at the mixed high school, in September 1965. He was in first grade. Very thin, with curly hair, he has the reputation of being an excellent student who works little and has to face ridicule because he is a stutterer. “He sometimes said it came from shock,” says a friend. We never talked about it, but I think it was when he realized that his father, who was the eldest, was forced to take over the farm, even though he might have wanted to do something else. It had a big impact on him and he didn't want to repeat that. »

A restless but not revolutionary teenager, young Bayrou is closely interested in May 1968, in his final year of high school. He demands the creation of a home, forms a group around him, finds his way. The years pass and Béatrice Jouhandeaux, who became a supervisor during her literature studies, meets him again, a young French teacher, at the Marguerite-de-Navarre college in Pau. “I was assigned to another area, far away, but I didn't want to go there because I had a disabled son who needed daily care. I tell him about it and he says to me: “Béa, I’m in politics, I know a few people, if I can, I’ll help you.” Fifteen days later I was appointed to Pau, she explains, her eyes misty. I will never forget. François is not easy to communicate with, is not affable, rather reserved. But he understands people very quickly and is deeply human. »

“It’s our own Juppé”

In Bordères, his sister, a retired ophthalmologist, now lives in the family home. He and his wife, Élisabeth – a former teacher who everyone calls Babeth –, a street further away, in a large building capable of accommodating their six children and twenty-one grandchildren. “It’s an old butcher’s shop,” describes Maurice Buzy-Pucheu. They knocked down a partition to install a large table. One evening when we were eating roasted chestnuts there, there were more than thirty of us! » Jean-Pierre Werbrouck, a former student of Bayrou in the 1970s who became a friend, sheds intimate light on the couple. “Babeth is his refuge, but he doesn’t talk about it. An extraordinary woman to whom he owes a lot. Intelligent, with an incredible sharpness of mind but who loves to remain incognito and hates gilding. »

Since the appointment to Matignon on December 13, the house has been guarded by the gendarmes – some were already present thirty years ago to protect the accommodation of the Minister of Education… “That period, as when he presided the department of Pyrénées-Atlantiques, has left the Béarnais skeptical, says a former adversary. But in Pau, where he was re-elected in 2020, he is loved. » A local journalist confirms this. “The station, the Halles, the bus network, the cultural center of Foirail… In ten years, everything has changed, it’s our very own Juppé! » The conquest of Pau is his life's work, shaped after several failures, notably against the socialist André Labarrère, ex-minister and mayor for thirty-five years. The local baron sometimes made fun of this young man too often in Paris for his taste, but he respected him. The evening that Bayrou was appointed to Matignon, David Habib, a Liot deputy who had been with the PS for a long time, successor to Labarrère and close to Cazeneuve, wrote to him: “André would have been very proud. » The parliamentarian confides: “Bayrou is not a big bourgeois and he always has very measured positions. Interested in Jacques Delors, admiring of Mitterrand, he telephoned me on the evenings of PS congresses to find out the results of the motions before the press. With Bernard Cazeneuve, they saw each other twice before his appointment. Bernard is very worried about the situation, but very respectful of François. » He invited him to the last MoDem summer universities. The year before, it was Rachida Dati. In politics, Bayrou the practicing Catholic is an ecumenical. “Dati, that surprised everyone,” remembers his ex-brother-in-law, Yves Dejean. But he's always one step ahead. Three months later, she entered the government… François will stay until the end of the five-year term, if not who? »

“He learns quickly”

“He learns quickly, so I hope that the succession of blunders of the first days made him react, because his Achilles heel is pride and the fact that he wants to do everything alone,” deciphers a framework of the MoDem. “I was able to speak with him, he is aware of the wait but sure of his method and that he is not going to give in to pressure,” underlines Laurent Jubier, elected left-wing (ex-socialist) who joined, with a colleague and soon a third, the Pau majority after having sat in the opposition. “I found Bayrou in dialogue and openness compared to the first mandate, where he wanted to go faster. I saw the “wise” side, taking the time to learn and pass on. He doesn't rush. It can disrupt the political-media landscape, but he also knows how to decide and has already created the arc of the socialists to the LR in his team. » Aware that the national side is much more difficult, the young man praises a mayor who thrives on debate.

An analysis that is not shared by everyone. “He knows how to hear but not consult and has never extended his hand to the socialists, always governing with the right,” says the leader of the Pau opposition, Jérôme Marbot. [PS]. It operates vertically, it is a municipal Jupiter. » In the mid-1970s, François Bayrou said in his French classes: “If you don't listen to the other, you won't be able to counter-argue! » He distilled his atypical, regionalist and European vision after class. And asserted his style. Often late, sometimes absent, always sure of himself. “Bayrou has no boss, he is a free man. He is not someone who lives in hierarchies,” affirmed, a few years ago, Marielle de Sarnez, his lifelong alter ego, who died in 2021. Here is Emmanuel Macron warned.