It’s taken less than three months, but it appears as if the French have fallen out of love with their new President Emmanuel Macron. According to opinion polls, Macron, who was elected by a landslide and enjoyed a 64 per cent approval rating, compared to the defeated National Front leader Marine Le Pen, is now floating at popularity levels around the 36 per cent mark. As one French publication has noted, Macron’s popularity levels are less than those enjoyed by United States President Donald Trump.
So why has Macron’s bright star seemingly fizzled so badly and so quickly? On the campaign trail, he was feted as a man with a centrist approach, one with practical solutions to France’s unemployment and stagnant economy. But campaigning is one thing, ruling France another — and that entails decisions that are difficult, affect people and bring a change in their economic outlook.
For starters, Macron has ordered a complete review of the French labour code, a vast and voluminous tome that ties its companies and employers into a regulatory straitjacket and allows French workers unprecedented rights that are unrivalled across Europe. It is a quagmire that has undone other occupants of the Elysee Palace.
As a committed Europeanist, Macron is determined to hold the French deficit to 3 per cent of its gross domestic product — and that means reining in spending of social and welfare programmes. Macron has also targeted absentee workers and has frozen the index-linked salaries of the bloated French civil services. Macron, however, must not be swayed from taking the essential steps to repair the French economy and social system. He still has a huge parliamentary majority in the National Assembly. Besides, there are no elections until 2022.
