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FRENCH PRESIDENT EMMANUEL Macron has named Jean Castex, who coordinated France’s virus reopening strategy, as the country’s new prime minister.
The relatively low-profile Castex replaces Edouard Philippe, who resigned earlier today.
Macron is reshuffling the government to focus on restarting the economy after months of lockdown.
In an interview with local newspapers yesterday, Macron said he is seeking a “new path” to rebuild the country for the two remaining years of his term.
He praised Philippe’s “outstanding work” in the past three years.
“I will need to make choices to lead [the country] down the path,” he said.
The new premier, Jean Castex, is officially a member of the right-wing opposition but in charge of overseeing the country’s progressive emergence from its coronavirus lockdown.
A wider cabinet reshuffle could now come later in the day.
Speculation that Philippe was on the way out mounted this week after Macron’s centrist party was routed in municipal elections last Sunday and Greens took control of several major cities.
Philippe, a right-wing politician who never joined Macron’s Republic on the Move party, easily won his bid to become mayor of Le Havre.
Yet while Macron was widely expected to seek to boost his socialist credentials with a leftist premier, Castex is from the rightist Republicans party.
While Philippe’s approval ratings have surged over his handling of the coronavirus crisis, those of Macron, who has pursued ambitious economic reforms since coming to office in 2017, have fallen.
Macron said in local newspaper interviews that France must prepare for a “very difficult” economic crisis, “so we have to chart a new course.”
“I see this based on an economic, social, environmental and cultural reconstruction,” he said. “Behind this, there will be a new team.”
Serving Macron from the start of his presidency, Philippe has pushing through a series of controversial overhauls that sparked massive strikes as well as the fierce “yellow vest” anti-government revolt.
Speculation
Press reports had suggested that possible replacements could have included defence minister Florence Parly or foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, both Socialists before joining Macron’s team.
But analysts say Macron had a thin bench of potential replacements, not least because his young party has failed to produce any standouts from its parliamentary ranks — meaning he could tap someone relatively unknown to the public.
Other top ministers could also be on the way out in a cabinet reshuffle that may be completed by the end of the day.
Under particular pressure is interior minister Christophe Castaner, who has been assailed by critics over the failure to contain the rioting and looting that marred the “yellow vest” protests of 2018-2019.
More recently, Castaner has drawn the ire of police who say he has failed to support them against renewed claims of violence and racism in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Already since the start of Macron’s presidency, a total of 17 ministers have quit the government, most recently Agnes Buzyn, who stepped down as health minister in a doomed bid to wrest the Paris mayor job from Socialist Anne Hidalgo.
- With reporting by Press Association.
WOW, all the pro-Chinese t-ro-lls already on here……..
I just read an utterly insane comment that HK protestors should be thankful they’re not facing the NYPD?!!
Just how blind to China’s, literal, decades long abuses of human rights do they think we are?
@Tricia G: the 50 cent army is always around for these articles to spout their muck.
It’s both Full Moon
@Seriousnojoke: You mean all those people being kettled in Causeway bay by Police right now?
@Seriousnojoke: You think people in HK should consider themselves lucky because they are not dealing with NYPD. I disagree, Hong Kongers are lucky because the CCP have been kind not send them to concentration camps like the have for the Uyghurs in mainland China.
@Seriousnojoke: Pro-PRC troll.
@Seriousnojoke: LMFAO
@Seriousnojoke: You are a CCP pansy. The police harrassed a senior citizen for carry a yellow balloon ffs and charge groups of people who gather to cross the street at crossings, then arrest minors for baseless charges. Reading an Apple daily publication gains you the attention of police, like the guy alone in the MTR surround by 12 or more police while he read the paper.
@Seriousnojoke: propaganda troll for the CCP.
@Little Pudding: “the CCP have been kind not send them to concentration camps like the have for the Uyghurs”
Give them time!
Move to Taiwan and report from there instead. That will really pi*s off the CCP.
25 years ago, I was worried about China for all of us…. kept saying that in several debates… here we are….
Apple Daily, full lies, bias views or opinions, we call it as poison Apple, just like Fox News, other media debunks their lies and nobody’s cares.
In hk, the journalist was cheap, just pay €25 that is all. The most time they have tons of “journalists” standing between police and riots, literally standing between them. The police couldn’t do their job, just like mosquitos, so annoying. One of the photo i’ve see is one police hold smoke grenade gun standing at the corner and aim, that is all on hk media, but the full photo is about 50 journalists around him and taking photo of him, who cares about that?
Denzel Washington said if you read the newspaper, if you don’t read it, you’re misinformed, What is the long-term effect of too much information? One of the effects is the need to be first, not even to be true anymore.”
So what a responsibility you all have; to tell the truth, not to just be first, but to tell the truth.
“We live in a society now where it’s just first. Who cares? Get it out there. We don’t care who it hurts, we don’t care who we destroy, we don’t care if it’s true. Just say it, sell it.”
Harrow
I had a comment deleted because I was critical of journalists and their of of the tv licence scam
have your say