A first anniversary of re-election marred by a political storm. By decreeing a strange period of one hundred days to revive, after the much criticized pension reform, Emmanuel Macron has thus recorded the political impasse from which he is struggling to extricate himself. Back to the key dates of the first year of the second five-year term of the Head of State.
On April 24, 2022, Emmanuel Macron was re-elected at age 44, defeating Marine Le Pen in the second round of the presidential election, like five years earlier. But with 41.45% of the vote, the candidate of the National Rally obtains a historic score against the Head of State (58.55%). Outside the period of cohabitation, he managed to become the first president re-elected under the Fifth Republic and the third to serve a second term after François Mitterrand (1981-1995) and Jacques Chirac (1995-2007).
Thirty years after the departure of Edith Cresson, Elisabeth Borne becomes the second woman appointed to the post of Prime Minister, succeeding Jean Castex. During Emmanuel Macron’s first five-year term, the former boss of the RATP was entrusted with three ministries: Transport, Ecological Transition and Labour. After Georges Pompidou, Raymond Barre and Dominique de Villepin, she is the fourth head of government under the Fifth Republic to have never sought an elective mandate by universal suffrage before her appointment.
The start of Emmanuel Macron’s second term is characterized by a turbulent legislative election campaign that ends in a slap in the face for the head of state. At the end of the second round, marked by a historic abstention (52.4%) and a double breakthrough of the Nupes (131 deputies) and the RN (89 deputies), the macronists retain only 250 seats (including 172 from the group Renaissance, ex-LREM) out of 577, with 39 votes of an absolute majority.
Three new ministers are defeated and ousted from the first Borne government: Amélie de Montchalin, Brigitte Bourguignon and Justine Benin. Yaël Braun-Pivet becomes the first president of the National Assembly. In the corridors of the Assembly, the debates were more than ever electric over the past year with ten appeals to 49.3 on the part of the government and twelve motions of censure tabled to vote on the 2023 budgets of the State and the Social Security.
Stopped motorists and resurgent social tensions. A strike of more than 35 days for wages in refineries and fuel depots, started at the end of September by the CGT, causes shortages and gradually extends to nuclear power plants. To get out of the crisis and help the French, the government is offering a rebate on fuel and a shield against rising energy prices.
On September 23, the secretary general of the Élysée and the president’s right-hand man, Alexis Kohler, was indicted for “illegal taking of interests” in an investigation linked to the Italian-Swiss shipowner MSC. On October 3, the Keeper of the Seals Éric Dupond-Moretti was sent to trial for “illegal taking of interests” in a litigation case with magistrates.
Their retention in office is strongly criticized but Emmanuel Macron gives them his support. For Alexis Kohler, the head of state considered “completely legitimate” his maintenance because his secretary general “is not a minister”. As for the Keeper of the Seals, he considers that it is a “very special case” and an indictment taking place “in the context of a procedure which is a referral to the magistrates’ unions, on a case which involved magistrates “. This would not affect “in any way what he did as a minister or matters of morality”, continued the head of state.
It is a contested bill that has directly affected Emmanuel Macron’s image with the French. On January 10, 2023, Elisabeth Borne unveiled the reform to postpone the legal retirement age from 62 to 64 by 2030. From the first days, the mobilization of opponents was organized. On January 19, a first inter-union mobilization brought together more than two million demonstrators (according to the CGT), 1.12 million (according to the police). Twelve days later, on January 31, the anger intensified: 1.272 million people marched all over the country according to the police against 2.8 million according to the CGT.
After three months of political and social crisis, the Constitutional Council issued, on April 14, an extremely awaited decision on the highly contested pension reform. The Constitutional Council has decided to validate the essentials of the reform, including the postponement of the legal age from 62 to 64 years old. According to him, “no constitutional requirement has been disregarded” by the executive, whether in its recourse to an amending budget from Social Security to pass its reform or to the decried procedure of 49.3 in the Assembly. The Constitutional Council nevertheless rejected six provisions, including the “senior index” and certain provisions concerning the right to early departure for civil servants in active categories.
Emmanuel Macron wishes to give a new start to his second five-year term. In his speech on April 17, the President of the Republic spoke of the work awaiting the government and the majority during “a hundred days of appeasement, unity, ambition and action in the service of France”. . Emmanuel Macron notably listed “three major projects”: work, justice and republican order, and progress for a better life. The Head of State is already planning a review of these hundred days on a symbolic date, July 14, 2023.
After the enactment of the pension reform, Emmanuel Macron’s popularity rating fell to its lowest level at 26%. A quarter of French people say they are resigned, indicates a BVA survey for RTL published on April 22. The Head of State has lost two points since the end of March “finding the level reached” at the very beginning of the Yellow Vests crisis in October 2018. Of the 72% of French people who say they are dissatisfied with the President of the Republic, 47 % are “very unhappy”, a figure up seven points reflecting increased anger at his action. Determined to reconnect with the French during trips to the region, Emmanuel Macron saw his walkabouts be tarnished by cooking pot concerts in Alsace and Hérault.
Consult our file: Pensions: the big bang
