The French president instead has called for France to learn parliamentary politics and the art of negotiation that is practiced in other European countries, but his inability to take a step back is stifling progress, said Weissberg.
“The president must show that he doesn’t have a solution. He isn’t capable of showing that the ball isn’t in his court. It’s only by showing that he has lost, that he will win,” he said.
Fears are running high among centrists that letting the left form a government would give too much influence to Macron’s arch-enemy, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the leader of the left-wing France Unbowed party.
It would also mean handing power to a political group that has vowed to torpedo one of Macron’s hardest-earned domestic achievements, pension reform, and put in place other expensive policies that would increase France’s already worryingly high level of debt and set up a showdown with Brussels over spending rules.
“France Unbowed has several decrees ready to blow everything up, within 24 hours. They are very well organized,” said the same Macron ally quoted above.
But refusing point blank to give the left a shot at governing France could undermine Macron’s long-term efforts to build a wide coalition from the left to the conservatives.
“It’s going to be very difficult, the [moderate left] will dig their heels in. Some Socialists would work with us but they are prisoners of their [pan-left] political agreement,” Weissberg, the former Renaissance MP, said.
“Everybody is going to dig their heels in, building any sort of coalition will be difficult,” he said.