The relations which have become strained, even completely belligerent, between Christian Estrosi and Éric Ciotti, probable opponents in the next municipal elections in Nice, are not improving. On the contrary. The first criticizing in a letter sent Monday to the second of being the target of his “epistolary harassment” which he wants to see “stop”. “I had chosen recently not to respond to your countless letters” but “I see myself forced to write because there are things that I cannot let be said,” explains the mayor (Horizons) of the fifth city from France in a text shared on the social network
“I could respond to your attacks on taxation”, on “our stadium “too expensive”, our municipal police “not managed”, our tram line 2 “not adapted”” or even “a police hotel” whose work will not start”, unfolds Christian Estrosi. But what made the elected official take up his pen, he indicates, is the desire of the deputy, president of LR, to “conflict everything […] even mentioning “endangering the lives of others” in the valleys of the Alpes-Maritimes affected by floods.
“It’s not my way of being”
Éric Ciotti criticized the Nice Côte d’Azur metropolis, whose mayor is also the president, for its management of the reconstruction work on roads and structures damaged by the floods. Some were, according to him, at a standstill before the new damage caused by storm Aline on October 20, which “amounts to having deliberately endangered the lives of the populations of our villages”, he declared to Nice morning.
A note from the community may suggest that, deprived of certain credits promised by the State, the latter itself has decided to slow down the pace of construction to put pressure on it at the highest level. “You adorn our intercommunity with all the evils […] based on internal documents obtained fraudulently and by making them say something other than what they say,” retorts Christian Estrosi.
“I responded to your request aimed at definitively and as a priority reconstructing the Madonne des Fenestre or Boréon roads at a cost of 40 million euros. However, they were taken away. I could hold you responsible for this because it was you who recommended these choices to the detriment of the heart of the village of Saint-Martin. [Vésubie] but that’s not my way of being,” he attacks in response.
The 2026 election in sight
“You can always defend the idea that it is also the mayor of Nice who triggers natural disasters and bears “heavy responsibility” for storms at a time when the whole world is experiencing storm after storm, I think that does not convince », also decides Christian Estrosi. The mayor asks Éric Ciotti to “reintroduce calm and reason into [leurs] institutional relations, and why not personal”, well aware that “the electoral debate will come”. The parliamentarian does not hide his ambitions for the town hall of Nice.
For the 2020 municipal elections, he had already positioned himself before finally giving up, the LR executives at the time calling for unity and coming together behind Christian Estrosi. Having since moved to the side of the presidential majority, the future outgoing could therefore well find the deputy on his way in 2026. “But there are two and a half years left” and “I intend to make them useful for Nice, which counts more than all your destructive electoral strategies,” writes the first to the second. In the meantime, he said, “for my part, I continue to extend my hand to you.” Not sure that Éric Ciotti, who had not responded to this letter at the time of publication of this article, understands it in this context.