Ithought she was doing well, but was quickly reprimanded. Yannick Jadot, environmental candidate in the presidential election, was invited to speak before the European Parliament in front of the MEPs present. He launched into a speech with the accents of a Franco-French electoral campaign contest, targeting Emmanuel Macron, and it did not please everyone.
“You have undeniably made a fine speech,” launched Yannick Jadot to the address of the French president, who had just presented the priorities for the semester of the French presidency of the EU. “But you are accountable for a balance sheet for France and a balance sheet for Europe, he continued. You will go down in history as the president of climate inaction.
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The environmentalist MEP criticized the French president for seeking to “save a nuclear power plant condemned to bankruptcy”, of “signing armistices with the lobbies” and of “procrastinating, fantasizing about solutions in 10, 15 or 20 years”, prompting outraged reactions in the hemicycle. Placing his intervention on the level of national politics, he criticized Emmanuel Macron for “deciding every day to tear down the tents” of migrants in Calais.
Shocked MEPs
“Our Europe will never be yours, that of climate renunciation, that of glyphosate, that of the unhindered circulation of goods, services and finance, but walls, barbed wire and watchtowers and humiliations for women and men”, he concluded, arms outstretched towards Emmanuel Macron, at the end of his intervention which looked like a personal address against a political rival.
Applauded by his political group, Yannick Jadot also provoked outraged reactions among his colleagues, some of whom loudly expressed their opposition to his statements. The leader of the S & D group (socialists and democrats), the Spaniard Iratxe Garcia Pérez, as well as that of the Renew group (liberals), the Frenchman Stéphane Séjourné, each sent a point of order to the ecologist. “I will ask you to respect the debate. (…) This is not the time to intervene in this way, ”reacted Iratxe Garcia Pérez. “What a shame to transform this hemicycle into a National Assembly, it is not respectful! added Stéphane Séjourné. “Respect must reign in this chamber,” demanded the new President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola.