On the ministers' bench at the Assemblée Nationale on Thursday, January 16, French Prime Minister François Bayrou drank in the words of the Parti Socialiste (PS) leader: from the podium, Olivier Faure announced that he would not be voting on the motion of no confidence submitted by radical-left La France Insoumise (LFI), the Greens and the communists. "After a lot of work, discussions and negotiations," Faure had managed to convince his party members not to side with LFI. Eventually, LFI's motion of no confidence garnered 131 votes, far from the necessary majority of 288 votes.

Bayrou doesn't have a majority in the Assemblée, but he did succeed where his three predecessors have failed since 2022. He has the assurance that the Socialists, in a pivotal position, will not cast its votes with those who seek to overthrow him. His government thus escapes, at least temporarily, the tutelage of the far-right Rassemblement National (RN). "Another path is emerging," breathed the prime minister on Thursday, January 16, the date on which LFI's Jean-Luc Mélenchon had promised to topple him.

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