Is France Ready for a President?

Valérie Pécresse, the surprise winner of the primary elections of Les Républicains (LR), the sister party of the CDU / CSU, wants to believe it.

"I can beat Emmanuel Macron," she told the Journal de dimanche on Sunday.

On Saturday, the 54-year-old president of the capital region Ile-de-France was nominated to the cheers of the supporters.

She prevailed in the membership vote with 60.95 percent of the vote against the deputy Eric Ciotti (39.05 percent) from the right wing of the party.

Michaela Wiegel

Political correspondent based in Paris.

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The party of the republic's founder Charles de Gaulle has changed its name countless times since 1958, but has never sent a woman into the race for the Elysée Palace.

“Together we can do it,” said Pécresse.

"Civil rights are back!"

She succeeded in what François Fillon did not succeed after his primary victory in 2016: All the losing presidential candidates gathered around her for a group photo.

In the party, which had long been torn apart by personal power struggles, this unity was tantamount to a small miracle.

Against Zemmour's revisionist theses

But will the unity be permanent? Pécresse has decided that her first trip as a presidential candidate will be to the Ciottis constituency in southern France this Monday. This is a clever tactical move, because Marine Le Pen and Eric Zemmour started on Sunday to woo the "disappointed voters of Ciotti". Ciotti had promised to use the army in deprived areas in the fight against drug trafficking and crime and to establish a French Guantanamo for terrorists. He said France was in a civilization war against Islamism and defended the thesis that France was experiencing a population exchange.

Pécresse faces the challenge of not allowing this part of the members to migrate to Le Pen and Zemmour. She immediately made it clear that she rejected Zemmour's revisionist theses that the Nazi ally Philippe Pétain had protected the Jews at the time. The village of Saint-Martin-Vésubie, which she visits with Ciotti, embodies “France that is courageous and true to its values”. Saint-Martin-Vésubie has been named "Place of the Righteous Among the Nations" because residents hid and saved Jews there during World War II.

“You don't have to be extremist to go on the offensive.

You don't need to be abusive to convince, ”said Pécresse after her primary victory.

It was a clear reference to Zemmour, who had given a woman in Marseilles a finger.

"Fear-makers have never been effective in their deeds," she said.

She had to cancel the rally planned for next weekend due to the increasing corona cases: "We are the party of responsibility," she said.

Longing for factual administration

At the same time, Pécresse dealt against the "Zig-zag President Macron", who "wants to please instead of act".

It went to court on the “irresponsible debt policy” of the Macron era.

Macron had "burned the reserves".

She criticized that he would leave the problems of France to future generations.

As an "inheritance", she listed debts, foreign trade deficit, tax burden, a drained civil service and a chronic crisis of authority.

She wants to "repair" France again.