July 11. Four days have passed since the second round of the legislative elections and still no candidate from the New Popular Front (NFP) for Matignon. On the BFMTV set, Sandrine Rousseau professes: “By not having a name, we leave room for all comments”. Including those from our European and transatlantic neighbors who did not fail to point out the difficulties encountered by the alliance, “unable to agree on a possible Prime Minister”, mocks the Swiss Radio Television. Same story on the other side of the border: “A week after the vote, the French left is still seeking a united agreement to propose a name for prime minister”, act The Republic.
And the transalpine daily life The Post to add: “So far, the negotiations within the NFP have only resulted in a series of mutual accusations.” A “spectacle that is turning into a veritable endless soap opera, worthy of Dallas and which gives a rather unsettling glimpse of what the daily life of an NFP government might look like”, mock The weather. Across the Channel, The Guardianbelieves that this lack of agreement places the New Popular Front more than ever in an “impasse”. In Spain, The Countryspeaks of a “divided” French left, whose disagreements “darken the unexpected victory in the legislative elections on July 7th.”
“Showdown” between the PS and LFI
Whether Spanish, British, Swiss or American, international observers seem to have understood that the Gordian knot lies between two of the four parties that form the coalition born following the dissolution of the National Assembly on June 9. “The divisions are mainly between the Socialist Party and La France Insoumise,” warns the transalpine daily. The Post which presents the party founded by Jean-Luc Mélenchon as the political formation “the most radical of the coalition, but also the one which nevertheless obtained the most seats”.
On the one hand, the pink house “absolutely wanted to impose its first secretary, Olivier Faure, whose profile would be consensual enough to be accepted by the centrist deputies and survive despite a very relative majority”, says The weather. And on the other hand, continues the Swiss daily, LFI “would like to impose a more radical personality”. The British magazine Politico did the count: LFI presented “four of its leaders including Jean-Luc Mélenchon, three times candidate in the presidential election”, and notes: “all rejected by the socialists […] who especially pleaded in favor of their party leader, Olivier Faure” himself rejected by the rebellious executives.
La France Insoumise leaves the negotiating table
At the end of last week, a hypothesis seemed to emerge: that of Huguette Bello, “president of the French overseas territory of La Réunion […] MP for 13 years, alongside the communists”, before becoming a supporter of La France insoumise “during the presidential elections of 2022 and the European elections of 2024”, Politico reports. An idea from Fabien Roussel, notes The Postwhich did not, however, convince the socialists. The party with the rose “answered ‘niet'”, mocking The weather, thus closing the “episode […] the most concrete and promising so far”. A veto “which has reignited the powder keg in the fragile alliance, undermined by internal quarrels”, notes the Belgian daily The evening.
The height of the discord, however, seems to have occurred on Monday evening, when the coordinator of La France Insoumise Manuel Bompard announced that he was leaving the negotiating table. “This fracture comes at the beginning of a crucial week during which the government will resign and the new deputies will vote on Thursday to appoint a new president of the National Assembly,” warns The Guardian.
Since the beginning of the week, the rebellious lieutenants have been pleading for the NFP to focus its energy on choosing a candidate for the presidency. “For La France Insoumise, it is indeed fundamental that the left bloc succeeds in electing a representative to the presidency of the Assembly and believes that if this does not happen, the possibility of a future coalition government would be seriously compromised,” assure our colleagues atThe Post in Italy. Because according to Politico, if the NFP fails to agree on a candidate, “it would put an end to the NFP’s ability to present itself as a coherent group and as the leading French political force.”
Macron, the big winner of internal quarrels?
An analysis which echoes that of the Time : “The very young alliance of the French left is already proving to the whole of France that it would be incapable of governing”. A godsend for the master of clocks, according to the consecrated formula, who “did not ask for so much”, the Swiss daily ironizes. Because the big winner could well be the presidential coalition which would benefit from these picrocholine wars which “open the way for other parties, including the group of President Emmanuel Macron, to try to get rid of the most moderate members”, warns the American information site. Bloomberg.
Our colleagues from Politico also senses the same bad wind blowing on the coalition hastily assembled on the remains of the late Nupes “destabilized” by LFI, recalls The Post. “If the NFP fails to choose a leader quickly, opponents of the left alliance could sneak in to propose an alternative coalition and, in doing so, fracture its power before its members even have the chance to sit in the National Assembly.” Ultimately, one can assume, as the British daily suggests, that by thinking “never to win” and “to mask these divisions”, the NFP has indeed “chosen not to present a leader during its campaign”. Perhaps forgetting that if winning united “is easy”, governing united is less so.