1 month ago
20
François Bayrou, a centrist politician, will now become the fourth prime minister in a year, a record for France.
Dec. 13, 2024Updated 7:10 a.m. ET
President Emmanuel Macron of France appointed François Bayrou, one of his top centrist allies, as the new prime minister on Friday, as he struggles to bring the country’s protracted political turmoil and growing economic anxiety under control.
Mr. Bayrou, who becomes France’s fourth prime minister this year — an ominous record — must form a cabinet capable of shepherding bills through a fractured, cantankerous lower house of Parliament.
Most urgently, the new government will have to finalize an emergency budget by mid-December to avoid a shutdown of essential state services, although Mr. Macron’s opposition has suggested it would not stand in the way of such a measure.
And Mr. Bayrou must do all this without being ousted. His predecessor, Michel Barnier was toppled along with his government by a no-confidence vote last week and forced to resign after just three months in office, breaking a record for the shortest-tenured government in modern French history.
Mr. Macron is under enormous pressure as France wrestles with ballooning debt and a large deficit that have become among the highest in Europe. The interest on the debt alone soaks up 60 billion euros — the same as the country’s spending on defense, Mr. Barnier noted before he resigned, warning of an even darker economic future if the country didn’t start taking actions to lower its debt.
