Paris (AFP)

The president of the National Assembly Richard Ferrand, now indicted for "illegal taking of interests", is a close close of the close of the head of state Emmanuel Macron.

Parliamentarian unknown three years ago, became the fourth figure of the state in September 2018, Richard Ferrand, 57 years, emerged in the wake of the meteor Emmanuel Macron, which he was one of the earliest supporters.

The suit of this Aveyronnais man of confidence, the son of a building craftsman and a commercial employee, Breton since 1991, does not seem to have worn out over the years.

In 2015, he scraped the Assembly in the shoes of the general rapporteur of the law of the Minister of Economy Macron. In 2016, he structured ex nihilo the party En Marche !, before taking the lead in 2017 of an inexperienced group of some 300 deputies, to vote the reforms of the new president.

A minister praises "his commitment, his sense of sacrifice", which earned him the "affection" of the president.

A year ago, his name emerged as obvious after the departure of the perch for the Ministry of ecological transition of François de Rugy.

To set down his suitcases at the hotel of Lassay sounded like a breath for this inveterate smoker, tried by 15 months sometimes electric at the head of the contingent LREM of the Assembly, between management of the ambitions, hiccups and psychodrames. "This is not a good manager," reproached a member LREM, while others found it too distant, too directive, or too absent.

By gaining height at the perch, this elected at first modest course (General Council of Finistère from 1998 to 2011, regional councilor since 2010) before becoming in 2012 deputy of Finistère, has improved his coat of arms with the "walkers". Less in the locker room and more at the front, "he has political authority in the majority," said a parliamentarian.

- Sword of Damocles -

On many occasions, Richard Ferrand made the link with the Elysée, where he is regularly received and where he makes his former socialist sensibility (37 years of contribution) converted to "and right and left". He is "one of the few who argue with the president," according to a relative.

The President of the Assembly also calmed the relations with oppositions, which had strained under the Rugy era.

Demonstration last February in full wave of antiparliamentarianism in the wake of the "yellow vests": the bosses of groups, Christian Jacob (LR) to Jean-Luc Mélenchon (LFI), make an entry together in the hemicycle, behind Richard Ferrand, to show their "unity".

The private home of the perch holder in Finistère had just been the object of a fire attempt.

But in the spring, the forced reform of the rules of procedure of the Assembly, to "modernize" the institution, attracts enmities, oppositions saying "muzzled".

The property case that earned him his indictment weighs like a sword of Damocles for over two years on this former journalist, general manager of Mutuelles de Bretagne from 1998 to 2012.

The story, revealed in May 2017, has already cost him his ephemeral portfolio of Minister of Cohesion of the territories, abandoned a month later for the head of the group. This episode "of incredible violence", according to a macronist, also left important personal scars, especially for his companion, also implicated, and her three children of 29, 16 and 11 years.

But the affair does not seem to have undermined the loyalty of the head of state, who keeps him "all his confidence", as he announced on Thursday morning.

© 2019 AFP