The British weekly “The Spectator” describes a France divided between a Parisian minority embodied by Emmanuel Macron and a periphery won over by the National Rally.
The cabinet reshuffle of January 11 did not go unnoticed abroad. More precisely, one characteristic of the new government appointed by Emmanuel Macron struck the British weekly The Spectator: “Ten of its 15 ministers come from the capital, while Île-de-France represents 18% of the population.” For the conservative media, this “Parisian” government marks a failure of Emmanuel Macron in the face of the rise of Marine le Pen, “self-proclaimed champion of the ‘little people'” and of “Peripheral France”.
So much so that in the eyes of the media, “Macron governs in Paris, but Le Pen reigns over France.” The weekly recalls that the National Rally MP capitalizes on the best confidence index of the political class (39%) at the start of the year, far ahead of the President of the Republic (24%). Marine Le Pen, according to The Spectator, appeals to French people in the provinces, concerned about “the decline in their standard of living, the failing health system and the Republic’s reluctance to crack down on criminals.”
Conversely, the media claims, “Macron has never hidden his disdain for peripheral France – perhaps because he grew up in such a region (in Amiens) and familiarity does not breed not contempt?” Ironic about the order given by the head of state to his new ministers to be “revolutionaries”, The Spectator describes them as “bureaucrats, chancellors and yes-men.” Conversely, we can read, “the revolutionaries are in the provinces, the voters who renounce the broken promises of successive centrist presidents and turn to a party which, according to them, will finally break with the Parisian elite.”