Europe 1 with AFP 2:02 p.m., April 17, 2022

Invited this Sunday on Franceinfo, the national secretary of EELV, Julien Bayou claims to have "no reason to believe" in the ecological promises of Emmanuel Macron, expressed during the meeting of the president-candidate.

"He had five years to act and he did not do it," he said, explaining nevertheless that he will vote for the outgoing president "to beat the far right".

"A green Emmanuel Macron, I don't believe in it": the national secretary of Europe Ecology Les Verts (EELV) Julien Bayou said on Sunday that he had "no reason to believe" the candidate's green promises on Saturday at Marseilles.

"He had five years to act and he didn't. He was condemned for climate inaction, so there is no reason to truly believe his promises," François Bayou told Franceinfo, while assuring that he would vote in favor of Emmanuel Macron on April 24 "to beat the far right".

France "late" according to Bayou

The president-candidate delivered a long plea in favor of ecology in Marseille on Saturday, saying he had "heard" the message of the voters in the first round.

He notably promised to appoint a Prime Minister "directly in charge of ecological planning", a concept dear to Jean-Luc Mélenchon.

Julien Bayou recalled it on Sunday: "I don't expect anything from Emmanuel Macron, I don't ask him anything. My vote and the vote of the environmentalists is not worth discharge, is not worth support".

"The issue of April 24 is not whether Emmanuel Macron is credible on ecology. Of course not. The challenge is to beat the far right", according to him.

According to the boss of EELV, France "has taken an incredible delay" in terms of thermal renovation, organic farming, protection of biodiversity in particular.

And "the only solution" so that a new Macron five-year term is "not a five-year term of climate inaction like the one we are ending is that there are finally environmental deputies in the Assembly".

The boss of LREM deputies Christophe Castaner said it for his part on BFMTV: "The ecological question is at the heart of our action".

But "we obviously haven't printed enough on this subject," he admitted.

"Strengthen measures"

According to Christophe Castaner, "we must work on planning by sector and by territory, we must go twice as far".

The Secretary of State for European Affairs Clément Beaune assured, in "Le Grand Rendez-vous" (CNews - Europe 1 - Les Echos), that the president-candidate had not carried out, in Marseille, "a dressing in green" to talk to voters about Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the 3rd man in the first round with nearly 22% of the vote, and more broadly on the left.

He doubted the "very credible" character of Jean-Luc Mélenchon's program.

But the LFI candidate "embodied a hope on ecology, it must be heard, to strengthen the measures", admitted Clément Beaune.

Faced with the 200 billion investment in ecology planned by the Insoumis, he highlighted the ecological measures of the five-year period which is ending: "30 billion in the France recovery plan, 30 billion in the post- Covid, a target of 700,000 housing units renovated each year, the ecological bonus and the conversion bonuses... If we add up the total, we would probably be above 200 billion".