The President of France, Emmanuel Macron, has summoned all political forces with parliamentary representation for next Wednesday, August 30, with the aim of seeking new consensus that will help unlock a kind of “political blockade” of the government, which needs sufficient majority in the National Assembly.
Macron made official on Saturday the invitation he had already anticipated in a previous speech, when he addressed the country promising to take “the political initiative” after a tense first half, marked by the crisis of the social security reform and the wave of urban violence at the end of June due to to the death of a black teenager shot by a police officer. “The ambition will be to reach an agreement on lines of action that can be translated in a concrete and quick way (…) in the legislative texts elaborated together”, said Macron, who assured that his gesture is about “a hand extended with loyalty”.
The letter was addressed to all political groups represented in the National Assembly, including Marine Le Pen’s right and Jean-Luc Mélénchon’s left, which the president initially wanted to exclude as “anti-republican”, despite these parties having the second and third largest legislative bench, respectively.
The French president, whose government faces two major legislative challenges in the last quarter of 2023 related to the immigration law and the 2024 budget, has, in theory, few allies to offset his relative majority in the Chamber. Excluding the parties of Le Pen (National Regroupment) and Mélénchon (Insubmissive France), which position themselves as antagonistic to Macron’s liberal government, socialists and environmentalists disagree on most presidential projects. The party that, in principle, would have more points of convergence with the majority that supports the head of state would be the center-right Republicans, but its current leadership has been trying to distance itself from Macron so as not to lose more votes in favor of Le Pen .
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