Port of Nice, 6:30 p.m. Thursday, May 27. More than two hundred people are crowding at the foot of Éric Ciotti’s office. Above the salt-and-pepper hair, small French flags are waving in the air among the smartphones taken out to immortalize the moment.
Between two applause, Christiane, a retired bank employee, jostles to get closer to the stage. She doesn’t want to miss a thing: “We are experiencing a historic moment, she whispers. Eric is the only right-wing politician who had the courage to do what was expected of him, we voters. »
Beside her, we nod. Raymond, seventy years old, retired trader, has voted for the Republican party all his life: “This alliance suits me. In any case, the party was invisible. And there, look at the world there is! The National Rally lives up to its name: it brings people together. »
Barely on the stage, the president of the Republicans announces the news of the day: the justice system rejects for the third time an attempt by his party to exclude him from the presidency, after his decision to ally with the RN. Applause and flag-raising in the crowd. A decision welcomed by Bernard, a historic supporter of the National Rally who will vote for Éric Ciotti for the first time: ” Eric did what was necessary so that our voice was heard, for a powerful right. I have a lot of respect for him. »
« Ciotti is a kamikaze »
A few meters from the office, a group of fifty-year-olds are fuming on the terrace. “Ciotti, traitor! “, Slingshot. This lifelong Republican supporter is not losing his temper. “He killed the party. He betrayed his voters. He’s a sellout, an opportunist, a suicide bomber: he blew up everything for his place in paradise. » Pierre is far from being the only one to feel flouted. In the streets of the city center, some Niçois like Marcus even say they are disgusted: “We weren’t even invited to the televised debates, which shows what he did to the party. How long before rebuilding? Ciotti went too far this time. »
Facing Eric Ciotti, in the 1st constituency of Alpes-Maritimes, the Les Républicain party has nominated Virgile Vanier-Guérin, while the Macronist camp is represented by a Horizon candidate, Graig Monetti.
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For its part, the opposition is banking on a long-term flop: “I don’t think he’ll gain anything from it, he’ll just get absorbed. It’s a losing bet for him, but also for the Republic, because the only winners in this affair are Jordan Bardella and Marine Le Pen,” says Juliette Chesnel-Le Roux, president of the environmental group at Nice City Hall. The New Popular Front is represented here by an LFI candidate, Olivier Salerno.
Divisions within the party
The left is not alone in denouncing the “pact of shame” by Éric Ciotti. As of Tuesday, June 11, his closest collaborators in the Republican party slammed the door one by one, from his chief of staff to his director of studies and his communications officer. A former collaborator explains this disjointed disengagement : “I was disappointed. I saw him start negotiations with the presidential majority a few weeks before joining the National Rally. I didn’t want to stay with someone whose convictions I didn’t respect.” While another close friend of the LR boss spits: “He is selling himself to the highest bidder for a ministerial post. The French don’t like weathervanes. He signed his fall and his political death. »
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It was in Nice that the president of the Republicans was able to find solid support through the figure of Christelle d’Intorni, outgoing LR MP for the 5th constituency of the Alpes-Maritimes, and candidate for his re-election. She is one of the rare MPs to have followed him in his alliance with the National Rally: “I had been thinking about it for many months. Not a day went by without someone coming to talk to me about a union of the right. I told them: be patient, it will happen.”
