Antibes (AFP)

Gérard Larcher continued Monday in Antibes his approach to refound a project for the right and the center, during a convention dedicated to transport and ecology in which was invited the Nice rivalry between Christian Estrosi and Eric Ciotti.

The Senate Speaker initiated this "great initiative" after the defeat of the Republicans (LR) in the European elections (8.48%). The first convention was held on June 21 in Valenciennes on the theme of reindustrialisation, with the president of Hauts-de-France and former LR Xavier Bertrand.

The host city of this second act was symbolic: Antibes, whose mayor Jean Leonetti is the interim president of the Republicans since the resignation of Laurent Wauquiez. Leonetti praised a "complementary" approach to his own convention, which he launched Saturday in the party to "rebuild the base of values" of LR.

Before about 200 people, the debate was divided into two axes: "mobility" and "sustainable development", with as speakers the vice-president (LR) of the southern region Philippe Tabarot, entrepreneurs, such as the club's vice-president Sophia Antipolis entrepreneurs Christophe Frey, Alphatrains France director Vincent Pouyet, Simon Bernard, co-founder of Plastic Odyssey (fight against plastic pollution at sea) and Mathieu Cambet, president of Reservoir Sun (energy supplier) solar).

Mr. Larcher, who had previously met the elected officials of the territories and visited the site of Renault Sophia Antipolis, as usual took notes, interviewing his interlocutors after the meeting, on the production of photovoltaic panels or on the disparity considered too great of the public transport offer between urban and rural in large intercommunalities.

"For ten years, and not just since spring 2017, we have witnessed a form of recentralization, of reconcentration in the verticality that comes from above, and this verticality has led us to roundabouts in the month of last December, "he said.

This meeting also turned into a new theater of rivalry of the right Nice, with the successive and more political interventions of the mayor of Nice Christian Estrosi and the deputy Eric Ciotti.

- LR, the "cathedral" -

"Are we forced to continue banging on everything, or can we say that there are good things being done?", Launched Mr. Estrosi, who "alerted for two years" on the "narrowing" of LR, "and we finished at 8%" in the European.

"I do not think Mr. Macron is the answer, I think even less that his political training is the answer." But "I just think you have to identify the opponent, and the opponent is the National Rally", he continued.

Mr. Ciotti had not arrived yet when Mr. Estrosi spoke, and he had already left when the first spoke.

"It was not those who helped to elect Emmanuel Macron before the first round of the presidential election who can today give us lessons of behavior," he said, targeting his rival.

Mr. Ciotti also delivered a message to Gérard Larcher and Jean Leonetti. "This renewal will be done first and foremost in our political family". "The Republicans are not a chapel, it's a cathedral. (...) We can not put on the same level the different chapels that can exist," he said.

"It's not a Convention Republicans, dear friends, we want to gather, Republicans have their place, it's my family, but I feel responsible in the Senate, to bring together very different people," he said. then declared Mr. Larcher in his closing speech.

Concluding the debates, the president of the southern region Renaud Muselier expressed a "feeling a little shared": "we decided to leave territories" is not "to take them hostage to a debate politician".

? 2019 AFP