Le Finistère rattles, Hérault grumbles, Haute-Garonne plague. In all these departments, which are so many strongholds, the PS has no chance, or almost, of sending a representative to the Assembly. There, as elsewhere, the socialist federations discovered, without believing it too much, the list of legislative constituencies generously granted by the negotiators of La France insoumise to their PS counterparts. In total, the socialist candidates will stand alone in 70 constituencies. Finally, alone, so to speak: already, the local barons of the PS are preparing their own foals for dissidence.
The president of the Hérault departmental council, Kléber Mesquida, a close friend of the president of Occitania Carole Delga, announced that he would present candidates under his banner; Delga will do the same in several departments of Occitania. “She does not speak of dissidence, they say in her entourage, but she wants candidates in her region with local roots and values that correspond to hers. She will be by their side on these terms. The message is quite clear: the president of Occitania will not campaign for a candidate linked to the Insoumis, she who, during the presidential campaign, criticized Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s arrangements with secularism and the Republic.
READ ALSOUnion of the left: “The PS is weak, it will burst”
Will the rebellion of the federations upset the national council of the PS, which is being held this evening in order to endorse the agreement signed with LFI? It is likely, even if the boss of the PS, Olivier Faure, has a majority that is probably sufficient. He has just received the support of Martine Aubry. In a press release, the mayor of Lille approves the agreement, without much enthusiasm. It matches its consent with significant reservations, particularly on Europe. Other mayors of large cities, such as Johanna Rolland (Nantes) and Nathalie Appéré (Rennes), also support Olivier Faure. But everyone can have a particular interest in this support. The PS mayor of Rennes must therefore deal with a fragile majority, made up of ecologists, communists and members of Génération.s. It is not a question of losing the support of its local allies by denigrating the agreement signed between their leaders.
Other tenors have already said it: they will vote against the agreement. This is the case of Carole Delga, who has just announced it in an open letter. She quotes, in support of her decision, Clemenceau: “You have to know what you want. When you know it, you have to have the courage to say it; when you say it, you have to have the courage to do it. “The president of Occitania is particularly poorly served. The Haute-Garonne, all pink land, is entitled to an obol, with two meager constituencies. Ariège has none, no more than Hérault, a famous socialist region. Another example, further north: Finistère is only entitled to two reserved constituencies, one of which will see a certain Richard Ferrand present himself. Suffice to say that the socialist candidate will have to be a suicide bomber against the president of the National Assembly…
The crumbs for the PS
If the PS had to save twenty or even thirty seats (those of outgoing deputies are mostly protected), the Insoumis have taken care to leave them only crumbs. Conversely, the Mélenchonist party parachuted candidates with astonishing profiles into socialist strongholds. This is the case of journalist Taha Bouhafs and Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s son-in-law, Gabriel Amard, who will both compete in the Rhône.
Very weakened after Anne Hidalgo’s pants down in the presidential election, the PS could probably only save the furniture. Olivier Faure was all the more helpless since, according to some, the ecologists played solo: at the end of the first round, Julien Bayou, their leader, reached out to Jean-Luc Mélenchon. Admittedly, he does not rush to the headquarters of LFI with his eyes closed. It sets certain conditions for an alliance in the legislative elections. But the boss of EELV negotiates first, assure some socialists, constituencies for himself, in Paris, and for his relatives. He beats with Mélenchon the first. Fabien Roussel does the same. The PS has only to follow: alone, it no longer exists.
READ ALSOPS-LFI agreement: “There is no submission”, assures Olivier Faure
“Olivier Faure first wanted to negotiate with the ecologists and the communists for the first round of the legislative elections, but the agreement between Bayou and LFI prevented him from doing so,” said a tenor from the PS. “The ecologists killed us”, denounces another. A version that Christophe Clergeau, a close friend of Olivier Faure, refutes: “Yes, it would have been better to discuss four, with LFI, the communists and the ecologists. But the alliance has been our vision from the start. There is a new landscape born from the presidential election, with three blocks. Uniting with LFI was the only way to make the left bloc exist. If it is split, it does not exist in the second round. Olivier Faure, who saved his constituency, will try this evening to convince the 300 members of the national council that the PS owes its survival to an agreement that weakens it so much.