Who is François Bayrou, Emmanuel Macron’s ally who became Prime Minister? – rts.ch

The Béarnais with shady perseverance, three times a candidate in the presidential election, had imagined an Elysian destiny. On Friday, the president of the Democratic Movement (MoDem) became Prime Minister of a politically fragmented France.

This admirer of Henri IV the unifier (born in Pau in 1553) will have to use all his political experience and his talents as a conciliator to deal with a National Assembly without a majority and where the New Popular Front (NFP) and the National Rally (RN ) are in ambush, ready for further censorship.

Support from Emmanuel Macron since 2017

After three unsuccessful attempts in 2002, 2007 and 2012, the mayor of Pau resolved for the 2017 presidential election to form an alliance with Emmanuel Macron, “a gesture of self-sacrifice” in the face of the “surge of the extreme right which poses the threat of immediate danger for our country and for Europe.

Skeptical and wary at first glance of the candidate of the “forces of money”, François Bayrou finally offered decisive support to the former Minister of the Economy of François Hollande who will be elected on May 7, 2017.

The two men had notably agreed on a major law to moralize political life, with the Palois expressing his “hope” for an aggiornamento.

Appointed Minister of Justice on May 17, François Bayrou left the government on June 21 due to the opening of a preliminary investigation into the file of alleged fictitious employment of MoDem parliamentary assistants in the European Parliament. He was acquitted on February 5 by the Paris Criminal Court, but the prosecution appealed this decision.

A sometimes critical advisor

Relegated to the backstage of a five-year term that he also wanted to make his own, François Bayrou will not lose his influence with Emmanuel Macron, becoming de facto an advisor listened to by the Head of State, but also a critical observer of his governance and its reforms. In 2022, he warned the president against a “forceful move” for pension reform.

In February 2024, the “cabourut” (“hard head” in Béarnais) delayed the government reshuffle after the resignation of Elisabeth Borne by refusing a ministerial portfolio within Gabriel Attal’s team.

François Bayrou explains that he dismissed the Ministry of the Armed Forces, indicating his preference for National Education (a former teacher, he was minister from 1993 to 1997) or a portfolio comparable to regional planning.

A defender of the province

Born in the village of Bordères on May 25, 1951, this son of farmers is as proud of his rural roots as of his roots in Béarn.

The man who was also a deputy and MEP is moved by the “chasm that has opened up between the province and Paris” and evokes the presidential election of 2027, the challenge of which, according to him, is “that we can reconcile France which fights at the bottom with France which decides at the top”.

The “watchdog” therefore becomes the architect of the recomposition still in progress since the dissolution of the National Assembly this spring, which he was one of the few to defend, judging that it had “made it possible to burst the abscess “. “When feelings and expectations are expressed, it’s better than when things boil in the depths,” he said in July.

The question of relations with Marine Le Pen

His courteous relations with Marine Le Pen could help with the expected pacification. A supporter like the leader of the RN deputies of proportional representation for the legislative elections, François Bayrou had given his sponsorship to Marine Le Pen in 2022 for the presidential election in order to “save democracy”.

But the support given to the socialist François Hollande against Nicolas Sarkozy in 2012 in the second round of the presidential election left its mark on the right.

François Bayrou must now find the right balance in a fragmented political landscape if he does not want to experience the same fate as his predecessor Michel Barnier, censored after three months at Matignon.

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