François Bayrou (73) becomes the new Prime Minister of France. President Emmanuel Macron announced this on Friday afternoon, after postponing his decision several times. The appointment of confidante Bayrou is not unexpected: his name has been around since Prime Minister Michel Barnier had to resign last week after a parliamentary motion of no confidence.
Bayrou is mayor of the southern city of Pau and founder of the centrist Modem party. He has been supporting Macron since he split from the Parti Socialiste in 2016, started his own movement and was first elected president in 2017. The fact that Bayrou was not a candidate for president that year paved the way for Macron.
The new Prime Minister has a long track record: he was Minister of Education for a number of years in the 1990s, and after Macron’s first election in 2017 he became Minister of Justice. He then had to resign early due to a lawsuit about fake jobs in Brussels, for which he was ultimately acquitted due to lack of evidence (party members were convicted). He was a candidate for president three times, in 2007 he received almost 20 percent of the votes.
On the one hand, Bayrou is logically seen by the opposition as an extension of Macron and macronism. But there is also compassion: Bayrou has a number of key points in common with the left and left-wing parties appreciate that he supported François Hollande in the second round in 2012, allowing the socialist presidential candidate to win the election against the right-wing Nicolas Sarkozy. Due to his age, the French right would not see Bayrou as a real rival for the 2027 presidential elections. He is known for his ability to compromise.
Stability and action
Bayrou must now get to work forming a government. Macron wants him to talk to all ‘republican’ parties. Read: everyone except the hard-left La France Insoumise and the radical right Rassemblement National – “the two extremes” according to Macron. The president hopes that Bayrou can find a path to “stability and action.” Bayrou will try to form a broad coalition, or a minority government that makes enough promises to the opposition not to fall immediately.
It’s not an easy task – and much the same one that Barnier was given when he was appointed in September. Barnier failed to form a broad coalition for various reasons. The left-wing parties, united under the name Nouveau Front Popculaire (NFP), wanted a left-wing prime minister, as the NFP had become the largest in the parliamentary elections. Macron refused this – knowing that a left-wing government would immediately be overthrown by the right-wing and radical right parties – and even then did not want to enter into cooperation with LFI.
Barnier attempted to separate the former ruling party Parti Socialiste (PS) from the NFP, but without success: the newly united left-wing parties continued to cling to each other. Because Macron does not want to cooperate with the RN, Barnier opted for a minority government consisting of Macronists and people from his own conservative Republican Party (and one left-wing politician). It was clear from the start that this government would fall in no time.
Bayrou could be more successful than his predecessor and peer. With his friendly and non-polarizing attitude, he has been one of the most popular politicians in France for years, according to opinion surveys. The opposition parties may be more lenient because they know that many French people do not want an even longer impasse after an already particularly turbulent year. The new Prime Minister can also benefit from the fact that the NFP has become more unstable in recent months and the Parti Socialiste may be persuaded this time.
Opposition reactions
The Parti Socialiste said on Friday afternoon that it does not want to participate in government, but also that the party will not immediately vote out the new prime minister if he adheres to certain rules. For example, Bayrou is not ‘allowed’ to use the infamous constitutional article 49.3, which allows bills to be passed without a parliamentary vote (Barnier fell on this). The PS also asks Bayrou not to provide assistance to the radical right, as Barnier did: the party wants “the guarantee that [de] government will not make itself dependent on the RN in any way, nor will it adopt its xenophobic program.”
The party hopes in this way to ensure that the government will lean more to the left. The Rassemblement National, which voted to collapse his government despite Barnier’s unprecedented efforts, hopes that Bayrou will also listen to that party: leader Marine Le Pen asks Bayrou “to do what his predecessor did not want to do: listen to the opposition.”
For the time being, France has a new prime minister, who will formally take over on Friday afternoon, but parliament and the country remain divided. So the question is how long it will take this time before Macron has to appoint a new prime minister again. It would be the fourth of his second term and the seventh since becoming president.