"I collect, I sift, I report," said the mad President of the Assembly from his temporary offices, near the Hôtel de Lassay, his residence under construction during the parliamentary break before the elections of June 12 and 19.

For more than six months in reality, he or his closest collaborators have met or called the deputies of the outgoing majority to sound them out on their wishes.

Then Richard Ferrand took stock with the allies MoDem, Agir, Territoires de Progrès, En Commun and again the young Horizons party of Edouard Philippe.

After final discussions in the coming days, a first salvo of nominations should be unveiled, the most delicate or coveted constituencies being postponed until May.

There is no question of leaving in dispersed order in the wake of Emmanuel Macron's re-election, but under the common banner of the presidential majority in order to win as many seats as possible.

Maps and census of votes by territory in hand, Richard Ferrand has drawn up his candidate proposals for the attention of Emmanuel Macron, who must put his stamp.

There have been no outbursts of voices or slamming doors so far, assure several participants.

But "it could be tense".

Why Richard Ferrand for this mission of trust?

This 59-year-old former socialist deputy was one of the first supporters of Minister Emmanuel Macron under François Hollande.

In 2016, he organized ex-nihilo the En Marche! party, then co-piloted the nominations in 2017.

Emmanuel Macron and Richard Ferrand, April 5, 2022 in Spezet, Finistère Ludovic MARIN AFP / Archives

He then took the lead in the Assembly of an inexperienced group of some 300 deputies, to vote for the reforms of the new president.

Depicted then as "brittle" and "authoritarian" by several of them, he hunts down "felons" who do not vote as one man.

"Highest Honour"

After the departure of the perch of François de Rugy at the start of the 2018 school year, his name is essential to succeed him.

This follower of three-piece suits and inveterate smoker defends the institution and its "efficiency" in a deliberately anti-parliamentarian climate.

He commands respect from opposition.

"He is someone attached to the defense of Parliament and with whom we can exchange freely", greets Damien Abad, boss of LR deputies.

"He has good empathy, is quite political, but hasn't had the results," grinds another group president.

The President of the National Assembly Richard Ferrand on the steps of the Elysée, March 8, 2022 in Paris Ludovic MARIN AFP / Archives

Richard Ferrand nevertheless demonstrates his central place in macronie.

He is at the helm to lay the foundations of the "common house" of the majority last fall, and makes himself, "he the man of the social democratic left, the hyphen between François Bayrou the centrist and Edouard Philippe the man on the right", according to an LREM observer.

The former Prime Minister shows a "willingness to empower", note many actors.

The President of the Assembly maneuvers in parallel for himself: he hopes to stay on the perch, "the greatest honor that (him) has been given to live".

Some would see him well in Matignon, but the judicial mortgage of his real estate affair with the Mutuelles de Bretagne has not yet been completely lifted.

Revealed in May 2017, it had cost him his short-lived portfolio of Minister of Territorial Cohesion, abandoned a month later.

Mr. Ferrand, managing director of these mutuals from 1998 to 2012, had been indicted in 2019 before being recognized in March 2021 as the statute of limitations.

The Anticor association appealed to the Court of Cassation.

On weekends, this Aveyronnais, son of a building craftsman and a commercial employee who first became a journalist, returns with his family to his adopted Finistère.

The President of the National Assembly Richard Ferrand during a session of questions to the government, January 11, 2022 in Paris Thomas COEX AFP / Archives

The career of the ex-socialist had initially been modest (general councilor, regional councilor) before he became a deputy in 2012.

He is sorry for the state of the PS, in search of "alliances in order to save a few deputies", which is "not up to the challenges for this great party which was that of François Mitterrand" .

© 2022 AFP