Christian Estrosi, in the interview published yesterday in the national newspaper “Le Parisien” and republished this morning on RMC/BFMTV, has reignited his candidacy for the 2016 primary, and he went even further by mentioning the possibility of “leaving the UMP. A party that is already dead, a party that only distributes endorsements,” and, if that were the case, “participating in a new collective venture.”
He decisively turns his back on the two former leaders of the party, Jean-François Copé, for his disastrous management, and François Fillon: “I disagree with his political line.” He also distances himself from his “friend” Nicolas Sarkozy, who, embroiled in scandals, is trying to make a comeback with the support of his aura among activists: “I could have every reason to support him in that case. But only if it’s to build a project, new ideas, and governance. Because not everything was perfect between 2007 and 2012, the Mayor of Nice and the President of the Nice Côte d’Azur Metropolis does not consider himself a ‘Sarkozy devotee.’ It’s even discovered that his ideal is Margaret Thatcher.
And indeed, restarting with someone who, during his tenure as the supreme magistrate, had as his first collaborator one who sells two “dubious artworks” for 500,000 euros to a mysterious client whose name he doesn’t even know, and another as an advisor who recorded their conversations without his knowledge before allowing their dissemination, demands deep reflection to avoid romanticizing the situation!
For Christian Estrosi, “The salvation of the right can only come from “local elected officials, the same ones who achieved extraordinary victories in the last municipal elections, in the face of little marquises animated by zealous servants who do not hesitate to betray one another according to their interests.”
It goes without saying that he firmly believes he deserves to be the one or one of those who should take on the task of rebuilding the party into a modern social-liberal party, with a strong popular… and provincial anchor, far from the inner Parisian circles and the bureaucratic elite.
But, is the party still the form of political organization, the transmission belt between the citizen and the institutions? No, or only in a very residual manner, says the Anglo-Polish sociologist Zygmunt Bauman, who aptly explains that the “liquid society” where maximum individualism is found effectively abolishes “intermediary bodies” in favor of direct democracy.
Christian Estrosi’s speech is interesting insofar as it seeks to link a strategic vision with the proximity of relationships with citizens, which is characteristic of mayors of large cities (and increasingly, of metropolises). Those who, due to the size of the territory, the large number of inhabitants, the complexity of the problems, must combine objectives with the process of realization and have efficiency and balance in action.
In a France that feels the need to regenerate, to enhance itself, to restore its full positive virtue to its heritage, could the rebound possibly be a “mayor of the Republic”?
That is at least what Christian Estrosi seems to think, feeling legitimized by all his recent electoral results.
