The UMP reaches an agreement to resolve the crisis.

The proliferation of fraud during the election of the UMP president and the vast masquerade that ensued could only lead to a compromise between the proclaimed president and his rival.

Now, each of the two rivals will want to claim ownership of this consensus of an outstretched hand, but the agreement’s text presents a softened, bland rhetoric, filled with clichés or even devoid of any political meaning.

Because it lacks the essentials: What will be the party’s political line? It seemed evident that during this electoral consultation, two visions and programs were in opposition, and a synthesis of the two never seemed possible.

And what about the implementation of the contents of the far-right motion (La Droite Forte by Guillaume Peltier and Geoffroy Didier), which won the most support from the members? All this remains in suspense. It’s uncertain whether simply criticizing the government from every angle will suffice to express a political line.

Thus finally ends the psychodrama shaking the UMP for four weeks. The sixth face-to-face between Jean-François Copé and François Fillon, who were contesting the party’s presidency, was fruitful. An “exit crisis” agreement was reached, and a new election will take place in September 2013, preceded by an electoral campaign to be held in the “inter-session” from July 1 to September 30.

A “High Authority” will ensure “strict equality among candidates and the resources allocated by the party.” It will direct and organize the entire electoral process alone without any possible interference from the management, its cabinet, or UMP services.

The UMP leadership team will be installed before January 15 with the reunification, in the Assembly, of the UMP and R-UMP groups, the dissident group of François Fillon. Besides the mayor of Meaux (Seine-et-Marne), who remains president of the UMP until the new election, with Luc Chatel as deputy vice-president and Michèle Tabarot as secretary general, “a leadership team will be formed,” the agreement states. It will notably include “a vice-president and a deputy secretary general,” respectively Laurent Wauquiez and Valérie Pécresse (who were part of the Fillon ticket), according to UMP sources.