France President Macron says he won’t name government until after Olympics

French President Emmanuel Macron has announced that he will not appoint a new government until after the Paris Olympics conclude.

This decision follows the New Popular Front (NFP), a left-wing coalition that emerged as the largest group in France’s parliament after recent elections, nominating little-known civil servant Lucie Castets as their candidate for prime minister.

Macron stated that making a new appointment before mid-August would “create disorder.”

Critics on the left have accused Macron of attempting to “undo the results of the legislative elections.”

The Olympics will begin with an opening ceremony in central Paris on Friday and wrap up on August 11.

Macron accepted the resignation of Prime Minister Gabriel Attal following significant losses for their centrist party in the recent parliamentary elections. Attal and his ministers agreed to remain in a caretaker role until a new government is formed.

In the French political system, the president typically appoints a prime minister who can command a majority in the National Assembly. Currently, no single party holds a majority, but the NFP holds at least 182 of the 577 seats, giving it a strong position to propose a candidate.

On Tuesday, shortly before Macron’s scheduled television interview, the NFP proposed Castets, highlighting her efforts to defend public services.

Castets, a 37-year-old economist and civil servant currently serving as director of finance and purchasing for the City of Paris, has no previous experience in party politics. Traditionally, the prime minister is a sitting member of the National Assembly.

In her response on X, Castets accepted the nomination “with great humility but also great conviction.”

But asked about the NFP’s proposal during an interview with national public broadcaster France 2, Mr Macron said: “This is not the issue. The name is not the issue. The issue is: Which majority can emerge at the assembly?

“Of course we need to be concentrated on the Games until mid-August.

“Until mid-August, we’re in no position to change things, because it would create disorder.”

He also said no parliamentary group had emerged from the elections with a majority and that it was not yet certain which would be in a position to appoint a prime minister.

He said he would seek to appoint a prime minister with the “broadest backing possible”.

Mr Macron’s comments sparked an angry reaction from some members of the NFP.

Marine Tondelier, national secretary of The Ecologists, one of the constituent parties of the group, said Mr Macron “must come out of denial”.

“We won, we have a program, we have a prime minister,” she wrote on X.

“Our voters now expect the social justice and environmental justice measures they asked for to be put into practice.

“The president can’t block them like this.”

Manuel Bompard, national coordinator of France Unbowed, accused him of trying to “cancel the result of the legislative elections”.

“This is an unbearable denial of democracy,” he said. “In France, there is no presidential veto when the people express their will”.