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Hollande’s ex-partner Royal joins government

New French Prime Minister Manuel Valls announced his hastily put together new "combative" and streamlined government on Wednesday which included a familiar name - Ségolène Royal, the ex-partner of President François Hollande and former presidential candidate.

Published: 2 April 2014 11:45 CEST
Hollande's ex-partner Royal joins government
Ségolène Royal (pictured on the left) the ex-partner of President François Hollande has been named in the new French government. Photo: Thomas Samson/AFP

President François Hollande had tasked Valls with putting together a "combative" government that will lead France into a "new chapter" after the Socialist party suffered a raft of humiliating defeats in last weekend's local elections.

Valls had just over a day to put together his new team of ministers, which did not incude any members of the Greens, after they refused to serve under him. The new cabinet is a slimmed down version of the previous 38-strong government and includes only 16 ministers – eight men and eight women – which is the smallest goverment since 1958.

While some ministers like Laurent Fabius, who has been in charge of foreign affairs, kept their jobs, Valls government contained some new faces.

Notably Ségolène Royal, 60, the ex-partner of the president and former presidential candidate who lost out to Nicolas Sarkozy in the 2007 race, who was named France's Minister of Environment.

As a Socialist Party stalwart, Royal was unlucky not have been named in Hollande's first government after he was elected in 2012, but reports claim that his then partner Valerie Trierweiler vetoed the appointment of the mother of Hollande's four children.

With Hollande having since dumped Trierweiler after news of his secret fling with French actress Julie Gayet was exposed by Closer magazine earlier this year, the path appears to have cleared for her to be brought back in from the cold.

She is still close to the president and would give him a muche needed ally in the government. Asked recently if she had considered quitting public life, Royal replied: "Never. After 30 years in politics, that would be unthinkable."

SEE ALSO – In pictures: Ségolène Royal's photo shoot backfires

In the reshuffle Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian also kept his post, but the former finance minister Pierre Moscovici was removed and his position split in two, with former Labour Minister Michel Sapin becoming Finance Minister. Sapin is a close Hollande ally and a supporter of budgetary rigour.

The outspoken Minister for Industrial Renewals Arnaud Montebourg becomes Minister for the Economy, which will incorporate his previous portfolio. Montebourg has been criticised for being anti-business and is famed for his run-ins with American CEO Maurice Taylor after he ridiculed French workers for being lazy.

Significantly Christiane Taubira, who has had a few run-ins with Valls, kept her job as Justice Minister.

There has been a change of Education Minister with Benoît Hamon replacing the unpopular Vincent Peillon and Bernard Caseneuve has been tasked with the job of replacing Valls as Interior Minister.

Najat Vallaud-Belkacem, the current Minister of Women’s Rights has had her portfolio increased to cover Youth and Sports.

Replacing Cecile Duflot, the former housing minister who refused to serve under Valls, is Sylvia Pinel. Stephane Le Foll keeps his job as Agriculture Minister.

Government has tough task

Valls has to deal with "an economic context that has deteriorated sharply", said Frederic Dabi of the Ifop polling institute, with unemployment and a public deficit that remain stubbornly high after 22 months of Socialist rule.

Growth, meanwhile, is almost non-existent and the exasperation of the French was reflected in Sunday's municipal polls that saw the Socialists lose a whopping 155 towns and cities to the main opposition and far right.

In a televised address on Monday, Hollande tasked Valls with implementing a package of pro-business policies known as the Responsibility Pact, which cuts taxes on firms that are widely viewed as hampering employment and growth, and imposes spending cuts of €50 billion ($69 billion).

He also asked him to set in motion a new "Solidarity Pact" that would include steps to boost spending on education and health and reduce personal income taxes.

 

 

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POLITICS

Explained: What’s behind the violence on French island of New Caledonia?

Violent unrest has disrupted daily life on the French Pacific island of New Caledonia - leaving several dead and prompting president Emmanuel Macron to declare a state of emergency. Here's a look at what’s happening, why, and why it matters so much to France.

Published: 15 May 2024 14:45 CEST
Explained: What’s behind the violence on French island of New Caledonia?

Two people have been killed and hundreds more injured, shops were looted and public buildings torched during a second night of rioting in New Caledonia – Nouvelle-Calédonie, in French – as anger over planned constitutional reforms boiled over.

On Wednesday, president Emmanuel Macron declared a state of emergency as the violence continued, with at least one police officer seriously injured.

What began as pro-independence demonstrations have spiralled into three days of the worst violence seen on the French Pacific archipelago since the 1980s. 

Police have arrested more than 130 people since the riots broke out Monday night, with dozens placed in detention to face court hearings, the commission said.

A curfew has been put in place, and armed security forces are patrolling the streets of the capital Noumea.

So, New Caledonia is a French colony?

New Caledonia is, officially, a collectivité d’Outre mer (overseas collective). It’s not one of the five départements d’Outre mer – French Guiana in South America, Martinique and Gaudeloupe in the Caribbean and Réunion and Mayotte in the Indian Ocean – which are officially part of France.

As a collectivité, New Caledonia has special status that was negotiated in 1988 that gives it increasing autonomy over time and more say over its own affairs that the French overseas départements.

Home to about 269,000 people, the archipelago was a penal colony in the 19th century. Today its economy is based mainly on agriculture and vast nickel resources.

What has prompted the riots?

This is about voting rights.

Pro-independence groups believe that constitutional reforms that would give the vote to anyone who has lived on the island for 10 years would dilute the vote held by the indigenous Kanak people – who make up about 41 percent of the population, and the majority of whom favour independence.

New Caledonia’s voter lists have not been updated since 1998 when the Noumea Accord was signed, depriving island residents who arrived from mainland France or elsewhere since of a vote in provincial polls, enlarging the size of the voting population.

Proponents of the reform say that it just updates voting rolls to include long-time residents, opponents believe that it’s an attempt to gerrymander any future votes on independence for the islands.

The Noumea Accord – what’s that?

It was an agreement, signed in 1998, in which France said it would grant increased political power to New Caledonia and its original population, the Kanaks, over a 20-year transition period. 

It was signed on May 5th 1998 by Lionel Jospin, and approved in a referendum in New Caledonia on November 8th, with 72 percent voting in favour.

The landmark deal has led to three referendums. In 2018, 57 percent voted to remain closely linked to France; in October 2020, the vote decreased to 53 percent. In a third referendum in 2021, the people voted against full sovereignty with another narrow margin.

And that’s what the reforms are about?

Yes. The reforms, which have been voted through by MPs in France, but must still be approved by a joint sitting of both houses of the French parliament, would grant the right to vote to anyone who has lived on the island for 10 years or more. 

President Emmanuel Macron has said that lawmakers will vote to definitively adopt the constitutional change by the end of June, unless New Caledonia’s political parties agree on a new text that, “takes into account the progress made and everyone’s aspirations”.

Autonomy has its limits.

How serious is the unrest?

French President Emmanuel Macron urged calm in a letter to the territory’s representatives, calling on them to “unambiguously condemn” the “disgraceful and unacceptable” violence.

New Caledonia pro-independence leader, Daniel Goa, asked people to “go home”, and condemned the looting.

But “the unrest of the last 24 hours reveals the determination of our young people to no longer let France take control of them,” he added.

This isn’t the first time there’s been unrest on the island, is it?

There has been a long history of ethnic tensions on New Caledonia, starting in 1878 when a Kanak insurgency over the rights of Kanaks in the mining industry left 200 Europeans and 600 rebels dead. Some 1,500 Kanaks were sent into exile.

Clashes between Kanaks and Caldoches in the 1980s culminated in a bloody attack and hostage-taking by Kanak separatists in 1988, when six police officers and 19 militants were killed on the island of Ouvea.

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