A third term for Jean-François Fountaine? The hypothesis fuels conversations in La Rochelle

The municipal campaign is well underway in La Rochelle. Mayor since 2014, Jean-François Fountaine explains in the press that he could run for a third term in 2026. An assumption that is causing a lot of noise.

It seems like a political stunt, a ploy. On the front page of the Sud-Ouest newspaper this May 2, Jean-François Fountaine would be up for a new mandate. Enough to fuel conversations about the old port, and arouse the curiosity of the rest of the local press…

In front of our editorial camera, the mayor defends himself from any premature entry into the campaign: “This is not an application form today. There are also other great personalities in our team who are capable of continuing, of taking up the torch. I will make this decision with my family in a year, a year before the election. You know there is still a third of the mandate to goe”.

So our colleagues from South-West have misunderstood?

Moving the hospital, new room for basketball players at the La Rochelle stadium, rehabilitation of the Tasdon bridge, the mayor details his long-term projects for his city, says the enthusiasm he maintains for political action.

His opponent Jean-Marc Soubeste, municipal councilor (EELV), laughs: “Projects like that of the Tasdon bridge date from his first candidacy in 2014. If he spent two mandates not knowing how to repair the Tasdon bridge, if a third mandate is needed for that, if that is the only justification , I think she is not good“.

Also read: Permanent closure of the Tasdon bridge: major concerns for the bill and road traffic in La Rochelle

Even if there is officially no question of a municipal pre-campaign, Jean-François Fountaine still draws the first lines of a program focused on the neighborhoods: “What would be close to my heart is the whole major project in Villeneuve, we are going to open the school which is the first marker of the renewal of this district. There is also a beautiful project to be developed in the Mireuil district. There is also a beautiful coastal park to be created on the Minimes side, there are still major projects to be carried out.”

Jean-François Fountaine seems to want to leave his mark as a local politician, concerned with very concrete issues, working-class neighborhoods, naturally more favorable to his 2020 opponent Olivier Falorni.

Olivier Falorni, who has been talked about a lot lately because of the end-of-life law that he defends.

Is the “sequence” (as the communicators say) third Fountaine term a counter-fire intended to assign Oliver Falorni to his role as parliamentarian, less close to the daily life of La Rochelle.

If nothing is decided for 2026, the fratricidal fight of 2020 between Jean-François Fountaine and his former friend and protégé Olivier Falorni seems to have left lasting traces.