Round trip to Pau en Falcon, Mayotte… Since his appointment to Matignon, less than a week ago, François Bayrou continues the controversies.
Monday, December 16, the Prime Minister first attracted strong criticism by choosing to chair the municipal council in Pau – a town in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques of which he has been mayor for ten years – in the midst of a crisis in Mayotte after the deadly passage of Cyclone Chido.
In front of municipal elected officials, he confirmed that he would remain mayor, as when he was very briefly Minister of Justice in 2017. No text obliges a Prime Minister to resign from his mandate as mayor. On the other hand, since 2014, parliamentarians cannot hold a local executive mandate.
François Bayrou said he was in favor of re-authorizing the accumulation of mandates for parliamentarians. “We made a mistake by (making) local and national responsibilities incompatible, it’s a mistake (…) I think this debate needs to be resumed,” he said. Stating that he would ask this question in his general policy speech. “I will suggest to future members of my government to keep their mandates and I will suggest to others (to have) a small antenna on the ground,” he added.
Mayotte, in France?
Tuesday, the new tenant of Matignon, alone on the bench of ministers, was questioned by the deputies on his choice to go, the day before, to Pau, and to only attend by videoconference a crisis meeting on Mayotte .
“You should not have gone to Pau to retain a mandate, but to the crisis meeting at the Élysée to assume your new role,” launched the head of deputies La France insoumise Mathilde Panot. When his socialist counterpart, Boris Vallaud, criticized him for having also taken advantage of it to promote “multiple mandates”. These criticisms did not only come from the left, but also from the LR, the RN and even the President of the National Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet.
François Bayrou justified himself by invoking the need not to “separate the province and the circle of powers in Paris”, one of his hobby horses. “Pau is in France (…) I was also in my place as a citizen,” he pleaded. He denied any disinterest from the government, recalling that the resigning ministers of the Interior and Overseas had visited the devastated archipelago. “The President of the Republic announced that he was going to go to Mayotte. It is not customary for the Prime Minister and the President of the Republic to leave the national territory at the same time.“, he defended himself. A shaky statement which once again provoked an avalanche of criticism.
Because Mayotte, colonized by France in 1841, became the 101st department in 2011. It is also the poorest territory in the country: half of the island’s population lives on less than 260 euros per month, indicated INSEE in 2018. A median standard of living six times lower than in mainland France, indicates Mediapart.
Inaccuracies about donations in Mayotte
Latest hiccup: Tuesday evening, during a special program on France 2, François Bayrou declared that donations for the victims of Cyclone Chido would be 70% tax deductible.
These comments were later corrected by Matignon’s press services in a press release. “To provide Mayotte and its inhabitants with rapid assistance that meets the humanitarian and health challenges, donations and payments made from December 17, 2024 and until May 17, 2025, will be entitled to the increased rate of 75%, within the limit of 1,000 euros”, it is written.
These donations and payments must be made “for the benefit of associations and foundations recognized as being of public utility working on site to provide free meals to people in difficulty, to promote their housing, including through the reconstruction of residential premises made uninhabitable , or to provide care to people in difficulty, following Cyclone Chido”, added Matignon.
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