French Media: Macron Wants to Appoint Prime Minister Within 48 Hours

According to rumors leaked from the Elysee Palace and quoted by newspapers, French President Emmanuel Macron “wants to appoint a new prime minister within 48 hours,” that is, by Black Friday, December 13, as stated to the French newspaper Parisien by some participants in a closed-door meeting between the head of state and representatives of the main political parties held at the Elysee Palace on Tuesday, December 10. The radical left-wing formation France Unconquered and Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement Nationale were not invited to the meeting, an oversight that could lead to a host of problems in the formation of a new French government.

“We came to tell him that we need a left-wing prime minister,” Socialist Party secretary Olivier Faure told reporters after the meeting. Meanwhile, France Unconquered leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon warned the parliamentary alliance of left-wing forces united in the New Popular Front: “Who thinks they can get a single seat without us?” said Mélenchon, according to whom “our allies are afraid. For us, it’s the other way around. We’re not afraid to be in a historic moment.”

Meanwhile, the chorus of critical voices about the Elysee Palace’s economic policies is growing. During a meeting organized in Paris by the French Energy Union (UFE), Luc Rémont (pictured), president of French energy group EDF, said that “investment in France is hell for regulatory reasons and more.” As an example, Rémont cited difficulties in connecting the data center to the power grid: “There are administrative times that are just not commensurate with what is happening elsewhere in the world,” the EDF president said. Patrick Pouyanné, president of Total Energies, said he absolutely agrees with his colleague: “We need to simplify the process, otherwise we risk losing investments worth many billions of euros,” he said.