After the disaster in Mayotte, François Bayrou misses his first major oral presentation at the National Assembly

As long as it lasts to be clumsy. For his first speech before the National Assembly, during questions to the government, François Bayrou took a long time, one minute and forty minutes, before discussing the fate of Mayotte, devastated by a cyclone this Saturday.

After words for “challenges” who are waiting for the executive he leads and which is not yet formed, he finally blurted out: “We are reminded by the Mayotte disaster of what is most sacred to us, our fellow citizenship, our compatriotism, by all those who are affected by the accidents of life. »

However, he was expected on the subject. His first steps as chief executive were shaky to say the least. He was appointed on Friday. Monday evening, while the Minister of the Interior, Bruno Retailleau, was in Mayotte, he himself flew by private plane to Pau, where as mayor he chaired a municipal council. First concrete proposal presented by the Prime Minister: the defense of the accumulation of mandates between mayor and parliamentarian… A concern far from the daily life of the French and the emergency for the Mahorais.

Curled by the left, Bayrou flirts with the far right

On this subject, he was crushed by the left. “I was at the crisis meeting with the President of the Republic. I was there from the first to the last minute. Only, I participated by video as the Minister of the Interior participated from Reunion”, he tried to justify to the national representation, adding a risky statement: “Because I have to tell you that Pau is in France. »

Before sinking: “It is not customary for the Prime Minister and the President to leave the national territory at the same time”a terrible colonial slip while Mayotte is a French department. Before continuing “There were municipal councils almost everywhere in France last night to vote on the budget. If I had been in a town hall on the 7th^e district or at the town hall of Neuilly, you would have considered, Madam, that it was very good. » An explanation which did not convince the left benches, from which there were protests « non » ! Taking up the arguments from the day before on the accumulation of mandates, he added: “There is a break between the life of the province and the circle that governs in Paris. »

For the rest, the Prime Minister displayed his desire to increasingly normalize the National Rally (RN), to which he granted his sponsorship for the 2022 presidential election. Responding to Laure Lavalette, far-right MP, he said his “expression of respect towards each and everyone who sits on the benches from one end of the political spectrum and each of its groups to the other”.

But, alone on the government benches, the other ministers having resigned, it is to the right that he looks. To Vincent Jeanbrun, of the Republican Right, he replied that we cannot continue, in “the cowardice that is ours, to maintain our current expenses by borrowing on the backs of future generations”.

To Félicie Gérard, from Horizons, he recognizes: “I never believed that the answer to all the country’s problems was found in taxation. » A way of saying that he will not be the one to accept the 60 billion euros in revenue that left-wing elected officials had found for the 2025 draft budget. “If growth and happiness were indexed to taxation, we would be the happiest country in the world,” he blurted. Turning your back to the left of the Hemicycle.