And Lucie Castets finds herself saying “Long live the Republic and long live France” in front of 2,000 to 3,000 people. What could be going on in the head of this senior civil servant, still unknown just a month ago, who is being applauded to the sound of “Lucie! Lucie! Lucie!” ? The candidate of the New Popular Front (NFP) for the post of Prime Minister held her first meeting on Thursday evening, August 22, at the Ecologists’ Summer Days in Tours.
This is the first stage of her marathon of left-wing summer universities: she will be with the communists in Montpellier on Friday evening, with the “insoumis” near Valence on Saturday and with the socialists in Blois next weekend. “She will carry the flame of hope”launched the Green MP for Indre-et-Loire Charles Fournier, continuing the Olympic metaphor. In the middle of all this? A possibly decisive meeting on Friday morning with Emmanuel Macron at the Elysée. Lucie Castets will lead the NFP delegation composed of the leaders of the four parties and their parliamentary group presidents.
The environmentalists had decided to hold their traditional end-of-day plenary session, dedicated to the NFP “new hope”, a meeting open to all. It is not certain that many people from outside the days made the trip, but a good part of the 3,600 people registered – according to the figures from the party leadership, it is a record – were there for the star of the day, or even of the summer on the left: Lucie Castets.
There seemed to be a little more than curiosity about the new in the attention of the thousands of environmental activists present. A sort of desire to want to get excited about a new unifying leader who no one has anything to reproach yet. From midday, when she arrived in the alleys of the summer days, Lucie Castets turned all heads and briefly interrupted the workshops in progress on her way through the park on Balzac Island. That same morning, when Marine Tondelier seemed to say that she was already there, we could see some activists getting up to look for the senior civil servant still on her way.
“We will remind the president of his duty”
Called on stage around 7:30 p.m., Lucie Castets thanked the activists for “energy” that they give him in “this very special summer”. While she is sometimes criticized for her overly “techno” answers in her interviews, the candidate began with a more personal verse. “The mission that has been entrusted to me is an immense honour, even if, I must admit, I have known summers that were a little more restful! (…) This mission that some call impossible, I call audacious!”
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