CNN :
French Prime Minister (PM) Michel Barnier has been forced to resign just three months into his term, after lawmakers on the left and the right united to support a no-confidence motion and plunge the country into deeper political instability.
A total of 331 out of 577 lawmakers voted against Barnier’s fragile government, seizing their opportunity to topple the veteran politician – and renowned negotiator – after his attempt to ram through part of his government’s annual budget on Monday.
His is the first French government to be defeated in a no-confidence motion since 1962, and Barnier is now set to become France’s shortest-serving prime minister in history.
Barnier’s cabinet is now expected to serve in a caretaker capacity until French President Emmanuel Macron names new leadership. Barnier is set to formally submit his resignation to Macron on Thursday morning, according to French media.
Choosing a successor will prove a delicate task, with the increasingly vulnerable president forced to appease lawmakers on both extremes of French politics.
Macron had appointed Barnier to lead a minority government after a snap election, called by the president in the summer, split France’s parliament into three factions, each well short of a majority.
The situation had immediately appeared untenable, and it collapsed at the first major hurdle on Monday, when Barnier was forced to use a constitutional mechanism that bypassed a vote in the legislature on his 2025 budget.
That allowed rival lawmakers on the left, who had long vowed to bring him down, to call a confidence motion in response, and the far-right National Rally supported the motion to see it through on Wednesday. The far right had also called a similar motion.
Pleading his case during Wednesday’s debate in the National Assembly, Barnier told lawmakers he was “not afraid,” but warned that removing him would make “everything more difficult.”
But he was forced to watch as lawmaker after lawmaker called for his ouster.
Marine Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Rally, said during the debate that Barnier’s “stubborn adherence to dogma and doctrine prevented him from making the slightest concession, which would have avoided this outcome.”
In the day before the vote, Barnier accused the far right of political blackmail, saying that they had agreed to his concessions on electricity tax hikes and medical aid for undocumented people before demanding more.
The far-right leader has been the chief antagonist throughout the Macron era, challenging him in two presidential elections and now dispatching the prime minister he handpicked to settle a simmering crisis.
She placed the blame for the fall of Barnier’s government squarely on Macron’s shoulders.
“He’s the one most responsible for the current situation,” she said following the vote.
Macron “will assume his responsibilities, he will do what his reason and his conscience dictate to him,” she said in an interview with French broadcaster TF1.
Macron will address the French nation at 8 p.m. on Thursday evening, the Elysee Palace announced.
France is now hurtling towards the end of a remarkably volatile year without a prime minister or a budget. Macron is required to pick a new prime minister, but it is difficult to envisage a candidate who would expect the support of both the leftists and the far-right.
