Francois Bayrou named new French Prime Minister, President Emmanuel Macron's fourth PM in 2024

French centrist party MoDem (Mouvement Democrate) leader Francois Bayrou leaves after a meeting with France's President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysee Palace, in Paris, France. (Image: AP)

President Emmanuel Macron on Friday named centrist leader Francois Bayrou as prime minister, handing him the daunting task of hauling France out of months of political crisis, according to AFP.

Bayrou,73, head of the MoDem group a crucial partner in Macron's centrist alliance, was appointed nine days after Michel Barnier’s government was ousted by parliament in a historic no-confidence vote following a standoff over an austerity budget last week.

With his appointment as the new PM, Bayrou must now look to pass a budget through a sharply divided parliament between three groups — left-wing, center-right and far-right — where no party or alliance has a majority.

Bayrou and Macron met on Friday morning for nearly two hours. French media reported that the talks with Bayrou had been "tense".

“The President of the Republic has appointed Mr. Francois Bayrou as prime minister and tasked him with forming a government,” the French presidency said in a statement.

After Barnier's administration was toppled last week, making him the shortest-serving prime minister who lasted only three months, Bayrou becomes the sixth prime minister of Macron’s mandate. He is also Macron’s fourth prime minister of 2024.

Bayrou's candidacy has raised hackles on the left — wary of continuing the president’s policies — and on the right, where he is disliked by influential former president Nicolas Sarkozy.
Other prime ministerial candidates included former Socialist prime minister Bernard Cazeneuve, Defence Minister Sebastien Lecornu, a Macron loyalist, and former foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian.

According to AP, Le Drian on Thursday said that he had turned down the job.
“I turned it down”, he told a French regional weekly. “In two and a half years, I’ll be 80, it wouldn’t be serious.”

Who is Francois Bayrou?

Francois Bayrou, appointed by Emmanuel Macron as France's new Prime Minister follwing political turmoil, has been a close ally of the president since before Macron's first stunning election win in 2017. Bayrou, 73, is a well-known political figure for more than 40 years.
He has run the Modem party, which now has 36 deputies, since its formation in 2017, according to BBC. Before entering the political arena, Bayrou was a teacher of classical languages in his 20s. The new PM served has served as the education minister from 1993 to 1997. But that was his last meaningful experience of government. Very briefly in 2017 he was Macron's justice minister, but stepped down after being accused in a party funding scandal.

He was eventually cleared of wrongdoing, but many of his colleagues were convicted. Bayrou's political base lies in the Pyrenean city of Pau where he has been mayor since 2014. Bayrou has run for the presidency three times, as standard-bearer of the centre. He was closest to victory in 2007, when he came third with nearly 19 percent of the vote.

On the family front, Bayrou has six children and is an observant Catholic.

The Political Crisis in France

According to the AP report, opinion polls indicate that the public is fed up with the crisis, with just over two-thirds of respondents to an Elabe poll published on Wednesday saying they want politicians to reach a deal not to overthrow a new government.
Every Prime Minister under Macron has served less time and office and there is a chance that the new Prime Minister will follow the same pattern.