President of France, Mr. Emmanuel Macron has in a big government reshuffling named a new prime minister for the country.
Mr. Edouard Philippe, who is now the former Prime Minister of France has been replaced by Jean Castex as the new prime minister of France.
According to political analysts this move was made by President Macron following the growing popularity of Mr. Philippe which is a possible threat to the future candidacy of Macron.
Speaking on the BBC’s News Hour, Christine Ockrent, former head of France 24 News Channel shared “Edouard Philippe has become more popular than the president which was never a good idea in any system even in a democracy. And also because Edouard Philipe has been doing a very good job by local standards for the past few years”.
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She indicates that the choice of Jean Castex is an interesting choice that is a signal to Macron’s resolve to make the France political system more decentralized than it’s current highly centralized system.
“There are two remaining years until the next presidential elections and Macron obviously wanted to have a fresh face, someone who is quite unknown in France although he is a senior civil servant, someone who has been around for quite a while and it’s an interesting choice. It’s a very classical one again, you know, a technocrat, gone to ENA, the elite university for civil servants but he’s also the mayor of a very small town [Prades] in south-west and Macron has indicated…that indeed France is too centralized a country and there should be more devolution instead” she said.
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Castex has worked for years in France’s health sector and is also a favorite of the people seen as a competent and clever choice for the job. He saw to the coordination of reopening strategy after their lockdown.
Macron is still on his reformation agenda in France and it is believed that this move is to hep him have a strong grip of the position in the coming years as he has two more years until the end of is tenure. It is possible that he will face competition from Edouard Philipe whose popularity has grown widely in France although it looks far-fetched now.
