It was their first tête-à-tête since the handover of power on May 14, 2017. Yesterday, Emmanuel Macron had lunch with François Hollande, his predecessor at the Elysée, to discuss the post-containment. The last meeting of the two presidents took place on September 30, 2019 during a lunch of heads of state following the tribute ceremony to Jacques Chirac, recently deceased.
“This lunch was courteous, frank and republican,” says one in the entourage of François Hollande. “Friendly and friendly, we even insist at the Elysée. The two presidents displayed a shared concern for unity in the special moment the country is experiencing. A special moment which prompted Emmanuel Macron to also receive Nicolas Sarkozy on Tuesday.
However, for almost two hours, the exchanges were sometimes bittersweet between Emmanuel Macron whose “anti-hollandism” was one of the trademarks and the former socialist president who did not forget the presidential adventure launched solo by his former minister. No question, moreover, for the Elysee, to give this meeting a disproportionate importance. “This lunch is part of the multiple consultations of the president before his intervention scheduled for early July,” we note.
Appeasement rather than division
François Hollande did not fail to issue some well-felt warnings about the seriousness of the economic and social crisis, about the essential reindustrialisation of the most fragile territories, the renovation of housing and the increase in the purchasing power of the poorest. As for the political calendar, the former president, who gives more lessons than advice, clearly and firmly called his successor to appeasement rather than division.
In particular by using sparingly a tool such as the referendum – envisaged by the executive, by the end of the year, in the wake of the Citizens Convention on the climate – and by weighing the risks of a possible postponement of regional elections … What to bite the Head of State who, for his part, did not fail, to highlight the perverse effects, revealed during the health crisis, of the reduction in the number of regions implemented under the Holland five-year term. And to reaffirm, on the contrary, its desire to restore power to the departments … Atmosphere.
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