Paris (AFP)

"Figures that counted, figures that matter": while their party is weakened, PS parliamentarians gathered Wednesday night for a "friendly pot" in the Senate around major socialist figures, including Lionel Jospin, Francois Hollande, Jean -Marc Ayrault and Bernard Cazeneuve.

About 150 people - including parliamentary assistants - traveled to listen to the speeches of the organizers - the bosses of the groups in the Senate and the National Assembly, Patrick Kanner and Valérie Rabault - as well as the first secretary Olivier Faure and Mr. Hollande.

With the arrival of former prime ministers and former first secretaries Martine Aubry and Jean-Christophe Cambadélis, the rally was the widest in a long time, after the May European elections when the party, including ally Public Square, had to content to save the furniture (6.2%).

Objective of the evening, explained several officials: by appearing together, demonstrate that the PS has a story that matters, faced with a macronism that they miss. In power in the previous five years, "there were failures, disillusionment but we must not throw everything away and keep ourselves available," thus pleaded Jean-Marc Ayrault at the end of the evening.

Consensus figure if it is among the socialists, Lionel Jospin, 82, made one of his first appearances before the press since his departure from the Constitutional Council, in March. "We'll have to think for a long time" on the left, he said, without further comment. "When I decide to express myself, I'll do it," he slipped into a smile.

It is also the presence of Bernard Cazeneuve that has attracted attention. Some socialist tenors continued, Wednesday evening before the press, to declare it the best able to revive their political family in view of the presidential election of 2022.

Valérie Rabault thus wished, among these "figures who counted, who count" always, that he "become what he is, a central element for the PS and the left". For Patrick Kanner, "he has a special place in the heart of the French, (...) and can embody with others" the alternative.

The former President of the Republic François Hollande "also encourages" in the JDD Mr. Cazeneuve to take initiatives: the Socialist Party "needs ideas, identity and incarnation." Bernard Cazeneuve must be a player important, "he recently told the weekly.

Olivier Faure also said he was seduced by the hypothesis Cazeneuve, while arguing that "there is also the new generation".

- "Change generation"? -

On Wednesday, Mr. Cazeneuve did not wish to comment on the support, assuring journalists, smiling, that at the pot "there was no question of what you came for". The return to favor of the left passes by the "authenticity" and "ideas", he only affirmed.

In the evening, however, the former Prime Minister appeared to want Europeans to take the leadership of the left by calling on Twitter to "reconstitute a social and ecological left-wing force that offers France hope," faced with the "danger of one side -to-face between LREM and the RN ".

"We need to change generation," for its part Martine Aubry, questioned Wednesday on this meeting of former leaders. "For now we must find ideas, after we find an incarnation, Bernard Cazeneuve or someone else," said the Mayor of Lille, appeared smiling and relaxed, satisfied with "to be between socialists."

Many, like her, thought it was simply too early to designate a leader around 2022, like MP Guillaume Garot, close to Ségolène Royal: "We must first arm ourselves on the bottom, know on which we agree, "said the one who pleads for" constructive opposition "to Emmanuel Macron.

In his speech, Francois Hollande said that if "the social democratic movement is the first force in the left, then the alternative will be possible", and advised against "the frantic calls to the gathering that will not know a denouement" .

A probable allusion to the calls of Olivier Faure, but also a challenge to ecologists (13.5% in the European), who intend to continue on the path of autonomy, already projecting towards 2022.

© 2019 AFP