Voters in France were left awaiting the appointment of their latest government on Monday as the country observed a day of mourning for the victims of the recent flooding disaster in its Indian Ocean territory of Mayotte.
Prime Minister Francois Bayrou, who was appointed on Dec 13, is the fourth holder of the office this year and had previously set himself the deadline of naming France’s new government line-up before Christmas.
The nation has been in political turmoil since the summer, when centrist President Emmanuel Macron called a snap election for the National Assembly, in a bid to see off the growing threat of the far-right National Rally party, only for a left-wing alliance to emerge as the biggest winner, but with no overall majority.
After political machinations were put on hold for the duration of Paris hosting the Olympic and Paralympic Games in the summer, an extended period of negotiations saw Michel Barnier emerge as the head of a center-right coalition government, but he was brought down by a vote of no confidence after less than 100 days in office.
Bayrou, a former teacher and education minister, is from the MoDem party, which is allied with Macron’s own Renaissance party. His main concern is to ensure that any government he manages to pull together can avoid a similar fate to Barnier’s and get a budget passed, which was the issue that caused the downfall of the previous government.
When he was appointed, the 73-year-old Bayrou said he was well aware of the “Himalayan” task facing France, and said he would “hide nothing, neglect nothing and leave nothing aside” in his efforts to help restore political stability.
In a bid to defuse potential points of dispute from the outset, Bayrou has said he will review Macron’s controversial reform of France’s pensions system, which aims to push up the retirement age, from 62 to 64, and that has long been one of Macron’s most divisive policies.
Parties across the political spectrum have been vehement in their opposition to the pension reform, which has also provoked widespread public anger, but Bayrou has ruled out a total withdrawal of the changes.
Jean-Luc Melenchon of the left-wing France Unbowed party has already promised to table a motion of no confidence when Bayrou addresses parliament on Jan 14, but Sebastien Chenu, deputy leader of National Rally, has adopted a more cagey approach, saying the party was “not going to vote for a motion of censure immediately”.
A study carried out by polling company Ifop for the weekly Journal du Dimanche found that 66 percent of respondents were unhappy with Bayrou’s early performance, and just 34 percent said they were satisfied or very satisfied, which the company said is a historic low reading for someone so new in the job.