Christian Estrosi, the President of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (PACA) region, the man who has led the efforts to revive the French Grand Prix, has resigned following France’s presidential election. Estrosi says that his desire is to return to being mayor of Nice and has no ambition to serve in Emmanuel Macron’s government.
There have been rumours for some time that Estrosi was supporting Macron in order to get an important job in the government. His resignation should not affect the French GP deal that has been done with the Formula One group, which involves funding from different levels of government at local, départemental and regional level. It is nonetheless an odd decision and is probably related to the forthcoming parliamentary elections that will be disputed between June 11-18. This will decide all 577 seats of the Assemblée Nationale and Macron’s En Marche movement is hoping to establish a strong presence, or at least get enough support from moderates in order to begin the reforms that Macron has promised.
PACA is a stronghold of the National Front, with the party’s two current députés coming from the region: one being Marion Maréchal-Le Pen (representing the Vaucluse) and Gilbert Collard (in the Gard). Maréchal-Le Pen is the niece of Marine Le Pen, who was beaten by Macron in the presidential election. There is a fear that the FN will make big gains in the parliamentary elections and Estrosi’s move may be designed to strengthen the Republican position in the region. Estrosi and his supporters beat Maréchal-Le Pen in the regional elections in 2015, resulting in him becoming president of PACA. If the FN is beaten in Nice Estrosi may then be in a position to reconsider a role at national level in what will be a centrist government.
joeblogsf1 
Macron’s group has rebranded itself as République En Marche. Yes really: R.E.M.
I left that out, to simplify the story.
R.E.M.? Are they putting a man on the moon….?
They’re definitely Shiny Happy People.
Coat please
It’s (not) the end of the world as we know it.
Sorry Peter, it’s La République En Marche. More like an old pre-nationalised railway, LREM, rather than the more glamorous alternative!
glamorous only for the under forties….
I believe you are “off track” with that comment as I am well over 40 and a great fan of REM, as I have been for over thirty years.
Macron is into austerity so France could end up looking like Texas COTA always looking for money to hold the race. It would be nice if the new owners lowered fees.
I think this will get interesting, Macron still only had 44% of the votes in a 2 horse race, and from what I’ve read and heard listening to BBC WS France is still quite divided. Another world leader recently won with less than 50% of the votes, interesting thing democracy, maybe we get the leaders we deserve, not the ones we want.
Source? Everything I’ve read stated he got 66% of the vote.
I don’t know as I haven’t tried to find out, but I would suspect that perhaps the difference is that Macron got a 44% share of the people eligible to vote but as not everyone voted this translated into 66% of the people who actually turned out.
I think it depends on whether you count abstentions, spoiled or blank papers?
According to R4 France has a much higher rate of there (and counts them more accurately) that the UK.
I heard it on BBC world service, he did get 66% of all valid votes, but because there were so many spoilt votes, it meant he only had 44% of all available votes. I hope I’ve explained that ok.
I’ll try and find an actual quote, (but not a link Joe 🙂 )
I guess he means 66% of the 70% or so who voted and didn’t spoil their ballot papers.
Yes, but although French turn out was historically low at 75% of the population the other so called world “leader”(in quotes on purpose) did not win the popular vote of the mere 50% of the US population that bothered to vote, so he was elected by a very small percentage of the total population. US voter participation is horrible, and the last time we even reached that “low” French total of 75% was back in the 1830’s. Point being if % of voters = a larger mandate of the people, Macron has a far larger mandate than the crooked orange buffoon in the white house does.
44%, yes, like Charles de Gaulle in 1965 and almost all the presidents further on, Jacques Chirac excepted in 2002. 44% of the enlisted Frenches…
It’s interesting you feel that although the overall vote share was less than 50%, you immediately decide that democracy has not been performed or allowed correctly.
I believe that figure only counts if you include those registered to vote who CHOSE not to go out and CHOOSE their president.
It’s a similar response that we brits have become used to from remain voters and the relatively biased left wing media who have consistently refused to accept the result from the June referendum.
Therefore it is unfair that you can surmise that democracy has not been done here. The voter share of the population who did go out to vote was more than 50%, therefore the election was democratic and fair.
If the result is not to your liking then that’s fine, it’s your opinion and you are entitled to it. But don’t be dragging up this spurious argument about democracy not being performed correctly because it was.
It baffles me why so many people in the media here make an issue about Trump receiving fewer votes overall while winning the election. I’m sure that there have been examples in this country where the party winning most seats and forming the government polled a lower total of votes than the next biggest party. Even if I am mis-remembering that, the possibility clearly exists for it to occur under our system, so complaint about it happening in America is hypocritical.
I somehow doubt there’d be similar reactions had it happened the other way round and Clinton had won with a minority of votes.
Could this move mean the French GPs return only ends up being two or three years?
There is a contract
I certainly hope this doesn’t put the French GP in jeopardy; perhaps Estrosi will continue working on that project while he pursues his political career. But in the big picture, limiting the impact of the FN in one of its most popular regions is more important than a F1 race,.
Macron win may reignite rivalry with Renault chief Ghosn
This is from Japan Times and I know Joe doesn’t like links.
Thanks
According to ANE “Renault CEO Carlos Ghosn sees the embrace of globalization by French president-elect Emmanuel Macron as sign of faster growth for the country’s economy.”
Thank you, found it. News to me, interesting.
Interesting times in French politics. We have just returned to UK after living for many years in Europe, mostly France though in several different regions but always in the Boondocks.
Macron’s is a staggering achievement that may well get blunted in the Parliamentary elections. Historically the Provencal Mayors have had a fairly chequered history wouldn’t be surprised to find Flav popping up there, I’m sure nationality wouldn’t be a problem.
Numbers of our chums told us they would vote for Le Pen in the first round but no way for President, so I think there were just as many anti Macron voters supporting Le Pen as vice versa..None the less extraordinary changes.
Chequered history indeed…. we need only mention Jean Medcin and his family. Ask Graham Greene!
Forgive the question if you have already covered this, but what seems the “odd” bit is this chap leading efforts to revive a gp at Magny Cours: hundreds of miles away from his neck of the woods. Or is he proposing Nice host a street track?
You’re not up to speed, are you?
It would be helpful to have a second Joe Saward blog running alongside for those who can’t keep up with the first 🙂
Dontcha just lurve Dieter R?…..
Being deaf I watch a good few foreign tv series with English subtitles, and currently find “Spin” (Hombre des Hommes or something in French) quite entertaining while waiting for “Engreages” (Spiral) to come back. Both of these seem infinitely preferable to the real French political manoeuvrings.
Also will someone please shoot whoever positions the subtitles over the top three in the leader board.
Marion Marechal-Le Pen retires from politic life this evening, and resigned from the PACA region vice-presidence. This was awaited and confirms the intentions announced long ago. According to newspapers sources (Le Monde), Estrosi is playing a long term game, watching from Nice to the split between “hard” (?) and “soft” (?) right, and waiting a momentum to play a forefront role to lead the “soft” wing alongside Macron. The retirement of MMLP opens the game in PACA. The reason of its retirement is officially “personal”, but tensions with its aunt Marine Le Pen leading the FN are not a secret.
You read the news too…
i just hope that Macron’s case helps France and EU if that union wants to survive.
…and to paraphrase Harold Wilson, a day is a long time in politics as the BBC is reporting that Marion Maréchal-Le Pen is standing down and not contesting the June elections.
Yep! But wait… methinks she and Auntie Marine are playing games
Jeux sans frontières?
Non, le Front National ne veut pas que l’on vit sans frontières…
Macron won’t change France. It will still be stagnating economically with high unemployment in 5 years time. France just voted for Germany to run their country by proxy.
I think you should read more about Mr Macron
I’ve read a lot about Macron. Thing is we live in times where there is a paucity of good, let alone outstanding, political figures for the public to vote for, or against! And in France the extent of Macron’s connection with and regard by the Voters, is strongly reflected in the Voter turnout being the lowest for half a century or so!!