French government (already) must fall

Prime Minister Michel Barnier took office three months ago and is expected to be “censured” in Parliament this Wednesday.

The French left and Marine Le Pen’s far right presented last night motions of censure against the government of Prime Minister Michel Barnier. They complied with the warnings left hours before.

In the afternoon, himself Conservative leader opened the door to his downfallby resorting to a constitutional mechanism (article 49.3) to to approve the budgets of Social Security to 2025, avoiding parliamentary votinggiven his lack of political support.

“The Left presents this motion of censure today with gravity e responsibility, because it has never been on the side of instability and chaos. But the absence of dialogue, the disrespect for the proposals presented and for parliamentary work make censorship necessary”, say the deputies of the Nova Frente Popular (NFP) coalition in a statement.

The measure presented by this Left group – which includes socialists, rebels, communists and ecologists – is the most likely to be successful, since the leader of the far right, Marine Le Penimmediately declared that his deputies would join to her to overthrow the current government.

Le Pen’s party, the National Union (RN), also presented its own motion of censure, although this is less likely to be successful, as the Left systematically avoids joining the initiatives of the extreme right.

In any case, it would be the sum of the deputies from the Left, which is the first force in terms of number of deputies, with those from the RN (which is the third largest group in the Assembly) that would allow achieving the absolute majority required to approve the motion of censure.

On the side of the conservatives and the Macronist center, which are the forces that support the current government in a parliamentary minority, it was warned that the fall of Barnier’s government – ​​which on September 5, after a summer of complete political impasse – would plunge France into node chaos and leave her in “unknown” territory.

If the left and the National Union, the largest group in the Assembly, add up the votes, the French government will fall for the first time since the fall of the Government of Georges Pompidou em 1962.

Barnier’s government would then become the shortest in history of the Fifth Republic.

But it’s not surprising. Michel Barnier is from the Les Républicains party – which was the fourth most voted political force in July. Right at the time, criticism from the left and right opposition arose.

French President Emmanuel Macron, who is on a state trip to Saudi Arabia, still did not speak outalthough Elysee sources told the BFM television channel that the head of state wants “stability”, although he admits that the Barnier’s future is in the hands of the Assembly.

Voting on motions of censure will take place on Wednesday afternoon. The Left’s motion, which was presented earlier, will be debated first.