It’s no-go Sarkozy: Philippe to remain in post as French prime minister

Perhaps Paris’s political class – the nation’s “insiders” – were just bored. They have, after all, had nothing to talk about for the last six weeks except the coronavirus, which, horror of horrors, is important, but not interesting. At any rate, the fact is, contrary to rumours that reached gale force in the lead-up to lunchtime, Edouard Philippe is to remain France’s prime minister. Nicolas Sarkozy is not going to replace him.

Not for the moment, anyway.

On Monday, Macron let it be known that the Executive – i.e. the Government – was united on its strategy to defeat Covid-19 and spoke clearly “with one voice”.

Thus it was yesterday afternoon that Philippe, with his by-now trademark beard, dark on the right side of his face, white on the left, calmly, and at great length, outlined to deputies in the National Assembly a series of upcoming measures aimed at easing and then ending the lockdown that has been in place since March 17.

There were no surprises. The mantra remains, Protect, trace, isolate. The lockdown will continue as now until May 11. After that, schools will gradually reopen, long with stores, companies, business and public transport, but not coffee shops, bars and restaurants. There will be different red and green categories for different areas of the country. Those parts with a heavy rate of infection, such as Paris and Alsace, will reopen only slowly and cautiously. Others, such as the Cotes-d’Armor in western Brittany, where very few cases have been reported, will be free to move more quickly.

The Prime Minister told deputies – most of whom were only allowed to participate via video link – that France was moving into the recovery phase, adding, however, that large-scale testing was now the first priority to ensure that those who test positive for the disease, and all their known contacts, self isolate for a minimum of 14 days.

The lockdown, he said, had saved an estimated 62,000 lives in its first four-weeks, but France remained far from achieving “herd immunity”. From May 11, the target is for 725,000 tests per week. An app, known as StopCovid, looks to be almost ready, enabling the authorities, by way of mobile phones, to track and trace up to 25 contacts of any with phones who test positive. Concerns have been expressed about the potential threat to individual liberties, and the Assembly will be asked to approve the app before it goes into effect. But ministers plainly feel it will be a vital tool in preventing a second wave.

One of the criticisms of the Government response most often raised has been the non-availability of facial masks. Not nearly enough had been stored and supplies of those there were quickly ran out. But from mid-May, 100 million cloth masks per week are to be imported and distributed, plus 20 million surgical masks for doctors and nurses and other front-line workers.

According to expectations, there will be 3,000 news cases reported each day for the period after May 11. But the numbers of deaths and infections had peaked and phase one of the pandemic was passing.

In the meantime, social distancing and other preventative measures would continue into a second phase, starting on June 1, and into a possible third after that.

A vote on the measures proposed was scheduled after two hours of debate. No one expected the Government to be defeated, but the pent-up legislative frustration of recent weeks was expected to make itself felt, not only on what remains of the Opposition benches but within the governing En Marche party.

France, like every other country in Europe, is tense and uncertain of itself at the present time. There has been disquiet in the banlieues, with mini-riots breaking out, and a sense across the country of a nation in mourning for a lost way of life.

The rumour that Philippe might be sacked, to be replaced by former President Nicolas Sarkozy, the King of Bling, had gathered steam over the weekend, providing pundits with something to speculate about and newspaper readers with something else to think about beyond the daily roll-call of deaths and the ever-worsening impact of the lockdown on the country’s economy.

Cohabitation is one thing. Presidents frequently have to endure the humiliation of a different party forming the government after a mid-term election. There are even those who say that Macron and Philippe have already reached that stage within their own caucus. But Sarkozy in the Matignon? It would be as if Boris Johnson brought in Tony Blair to be his new First Secretary of State.

The danger was that such a move would be seen as the final proof, if proof were needed, that Macron’s principles, far from being rooted in deeply-held convictions, were at least as flexible as those of the next man, in this case Nicolas Sarkozy.

There are already many in En Marche who feel that their dream of being All Things to all Men (and, more to the point, all women) has been undermined by the President’s clear preference for clearing out the Old Left in French politics while regarding the Far Right as merely political opponents, to be taken on and defeated at election time. The suspicion on the still-dislocated Left is that the only real difference between Macron and genuine, up-front Conservatives is that he is a more original thinker, with sharper ideas directed at a near-identical agenda.

Bringing in Sarkozy – who still has a serious corruption case hanging over his head dating back to his own time in the Élysée – as prime minister might have increased the President’s credibility with elements of the Right, giving the impression of a government of national unity, but it would have alarmed, perhaps even unhinged, dozens of Macron’s supporters.

Not that anything is normal anymore, in France, the UK, Europe generally or the US. Covid-19 is not what Macron is about. What he is about is the wholesale reform of the French economy just as Boris Johnson is about Brexit, and Trump is about “keeping America great”. None of these very disparate leaders was prepared for a health crisis of the kind that was so suddenly thrust upon them. They are winging it and hoping for the best.