“The Les Républicains federation of Alpes-Maritimes, which I have the honor of leading with Michelle Tabarot, has just voted 84% in favor of withdrawing its support for Renaud Muselier in the regional elections,” is the shocking announcement made this Monday by Eric Ciotti, president of the party’s departmental federation. “The largest LR federation in France rejects the unnatural agreement with En Marche!” This is the official reasoning.
The decision was made before the national LR bodies could express their stance (a meeting was scheduled for this Tuesday, will it still be held?) and clearly aims to create a status quo.
For the record, Eric Ciotti is the president of the national nomination committee and already last week, following a party strategic committee meeting, had voted against supporting the Muselier list. Subsequently, he announced that he would not have voted for the outgoing president.
Behind the official statements, this deliberation highlights the opposition between two political lines: one of gathering and compatibility with the figure and action of the President of the Republic and his government, supported by Renaud Muselier, Christian Estrosi, and Hubert Falco, and the “orthodox” line of Eric Ciotti, David Lisnard, and others, which is resolutely uncompromising towards the presidential majority in all its forms.
In the background, there are the presidential elections in 2022, where everyone’s positioning is a proof of their personal ambitions.
What will be the position of the national LR bodies that this departmental stance anticipates and somehow disavows, if we reflect on last week’s deliberation?
Renaud Muselier continuously proclaims his affiliation to “his” party, and his list includes local elected officials with the same label. It will be interesting to see if the federations of other departments in the region will decide in the same manner as the Alpes-Maritimes federation.
What consequences can we imagine following this act? Two options seem most likely.
The first is that Renaud Muselier wins the competition, and in this case, the LR federation of Alpes-Maritimes will find itself at odds due to an action that will be considered reckless.
The second is that Renaud Muselier is defeated, and he might accuse Eric Ciotti and his followers of enabling the victory of RN/DN candidate Thierry Mariani, with the political consequences at national level that can already be imagined for a party struggling to define a winning political line.
Ultimately, in a democracy, it will be the electorate who decides!
In both cases, it’s hard to see what advantage Eric Ciotti could derive from his supposed dogmatism (in fact, we are witnessing a power struggle), except perhaps becoming MLP-compatible during the presidential elections in 2022.
As the earth is round, whether one sets out to “catch the east by the west” or vice versa, one always ends up meeting again.
