World News: French PM Michel Barnier Macron’s Hatchet Man

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Category: World News - Europe

Published on Tuesday, 01 October 2024 09:35

Written by Olivier Longhi

By placing the migration issue at the centre of his government's action, Prime Minister Michel Barnier is posing as a right-hand man of the National Rally, of which he has thus become the political debtor.

By announcing during his general policy statement to the National Assembly that "France no longer controls its migration policy", Prime Minister Michel Barnier is opening Pandora's Box at the risk of finding the ever more pressing demands of the National Assembly, the very one to which he owes his political survival for the time being.

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What for? Because by saying that he wants to better apply the Obligations to Leave French Territory (OQTF), the Prime Minister is already giving a pledge to the far right by giving it its victory with regard to one of its old demands. However, if enforcing republican law is in no way comparable to any political ideology, the instrumentalization of it by the National Rally today gives the impression that Prime Minister is acting more on command than by the desire to apply the law.

Budgetary Issue

Held hostage by the far-right movement, which, through this government of alliances of circumstance, can claim a victory by proxy in the legislative elections held last June and July, Michel Barnier knows that it will be difficult, if not impossible, for him to free himself from the vote of the National Rally deputies who will always ask more of the tenant of Matignon.

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And to what extent? For the time being, the march towards an increasingly conservative and discriminatory policy has begun, so much so that the budgetary issue, so often presented as the highlight of the obligations to be fulfilled by the new government, would tend to be seen as secondary, not to say anecdotal.

And the current situation reflects the paradox into which the country is sinking, if it is not already, namely a country eaten away by its public debt but focused on migration issues whose very essence appears more as a solution than as a fundamental problem. Far from having conquered power through the ballot box, the National Rally has conquered it through its political and electoral influence, challenging Machiavelli in the art of governing.

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Having become the éminence grise of Michel Barnier's government, Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella's movement has established itself as key players even though they are in the minority in the Assembly, transforming Michel Barnier into a right-hand man and his ministers into simple auxiliaries.

So, of course, France will recover, but the institutions, flouted and disowned, insulted by many, must take a blow here that undermines their historical legitimacy and opens the way to a worrying future for them.

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Bio: Olivier Longhi has extensive experience in European history. A seasoned journalist with fifteen years of experience, he is currently a professor of history and geography in the Toulouse region of France. He has held a variety of publishing positions, including Head of Agency and Chief of Publishing. A journalist and recognized blogger, editor, and editorial project manager, he has trained and managed editorial teams, worked as a journalist for various local radio stations, was a press and publishing consultant, and was a communications consultant.