“The political crisis is turning into a farce”, laments the Financial Times. Wednesday, twenty-four hours after proposing an alliance with the National Rally (RN) of Jordan Bardella, unanimously condemned by LR executives, the fate of Eric Ciotti seemed sealed.
His expulsion was to be voted on during an exceptional political meeting and the executives had logically arranged to meet at the party headquarters. But they underestimated Eric Ciotti’s determination to want to keep his seat as president.
“Ciotti, 59, elected president of the party during the primaries two years ago, and convinced of having the support of activists, contested the legitimacy of the political bureau, convened according to him in defiance of the internal regulations”, explain La Repubblica.
“Disarray of French politics”
So at noon he decided “locked the imposing blue doors of the headquarters and ordered all workers to leave the building,” invoking “risks” and “threat”tell El País. Finding the door closed, the tenors of LR, stunned, were forced to meet a few hours later “at the Paris Social Museum, located not far from the National Assembly”, where they voted unanimously to exclude their president.
For the Madrid daily, it was undoubtedly a day “weird”, characterized by “chaos” and scenes too “surreal” that “incredible” – like when the general secretary of LR, Annie Genevard, came to reopen the headquarters gate, shortly after 5 p.m., with a duplicate key – only to find that Éric Ciotti had deserted the premises.
“The astonishing scenes observed in front of the locked offices echo the disarray that has gripped French politics,” and in particular from the traditional right, “since Emmanuel Macron called early elections on Sunday to try to counter the rise of the far right”, observed The Guardian.
“Legal battles” in perspective?
Al Jazeera recalls that LR – and the parties to which it is the heir – has long been a “party of government”, bringing presidents like Nicolas Sarkozy and Jacques Chirac to power. But the training “has been stuck since 2017 between the centrists of President Emmanuel Macron and the far right”.
“Its leaders have struggled to chart an independent path, sometimes allying with Macron’s minority government to pass key laws, but also threatening it with motions of censure,” adds the Qatari channel.
But after these “twenty-four hours of frenzy”, according to the formula of Politicoit seems obvious that the traditional right still has “hangover”, ironizes El País. And “the psychodrama” is undoubtedly not over, underlines the Spanish title, because Éric Ciotti affirmed on X that his expulsion was “illegal”. It is “the door opens to legal battles, with two camps interpreting party rules to their advantage”he writes.
