It took Emmanuel Macron and Gabriel Attal almost a month to finalize their government – a record in the history of the Fifth Republic. The list of recruits was unveiled in a press release issued shortly after 8:30 pm on Thursday, February 8. The prime minister told France 2 television channel on Thursday evening that his new team would embody "action" and "results."
The promise of a "tightened" government has been fulfilled, with a total of 35 ministers and secretaries of state, compared with 40 in July 2023, when Elisabeth Borne's last government was formed. And most of the new faces are actually old ones.
Former tennis champion Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, swept up in a succession of controversies after her arrival at the Ministry of Education, Youth, Sports and the Olympic Games, has been put back on her former portfolio, although limited to Sports and the Olympics. "I thank the president of the Republic and the prime minister for renewing their confidence in me," she commented on X, no doubt conscious of having come close to being thrown out of the government. "There was a disturbance," admitted Attal on Thursday, referring to the minister's previous blunders. "The conditions for making progress on schools were not in place." To appease teachers, Nicole Belloubet will now occupy the flagship position of minister of education and youth.
The return of former French minister of justice Belloubet is the only surprise of this second governmental wave. In 2017, this former Toulouse local councilor succeeded François Bayrou, who was implicated in the MoDem European parliamentary assistants affair. Replaced by Eric Dupond-Moretti in the Castex government in 2020, she had returned to academia. Three and a half years later, she is once again, in a way, "succeeding" Bayrou, who had coveted the post. "Yes, I was available," Bayrou told Franceinfo on Thursday morning, 24 hours after denouncing a "profound disagreement on the policy to be followed."
The idea of recalling former Socialist Party member Belloubet to head the Ministry of Education came from the president, without offending Attal. On Thursday evening on France 2, the prime minister praised the "local and national experience" of Belloubet, whose ideas he said were "totally aligned" with the executive's vision of schools.
"The return of authority in schools is not [a job] for tomorrow," the head of the Republican senators, Bruno Retailleau, posted on X Thursday evening, while the far right and right-wing criticized Belloubet's alleged "laxity" during her time at the Justice Ministry. "A comeback, to carry out a policy that she condemned," wrote the leader of the Socialist Party (PS), Olivier Faure, on the same platform.
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