Nicolas Sarkozy on the set of C à vous, this Wednesday evening. Screenshot / France 5
Guest of France 5 on Wednesday evening, the former President of the Republic persists and signs despite criticism from his successor. And explains why he had included this institutional barrier in the Constitution in 2008.
It took a week to get the response from the principal concerned. Bringing together in Saint-Denis on August 30 the various party leaders, during a closed session for several hours, at the school of the Legion of Honor, Emmanuel Macron, who cannot constitutionally represent himself, had described this limit of “disastrous bullshit”. A barrier that would hamper his political and institutional authority for the rest of his term. If certain oppositions have strongly criticized this position, the pike of the President of the Republic was addressed to one of his predecessors: Nicolas Sarkozy. The former head of state had indeed introduced this electoral terminal during his major constitutional reform in July 2008.
Guest of the show “C à vous” on Wednesday evening, the one who left the Élysée in 2012 obviously had little taste for Emmanuel Macron’s commentary. “One, it’s not bullshit to use the presidential expression, two, it’s not disastrous. Three, if they want to change it let them change it“, mocked, in a lapidary tone, Nicolas Sarkozy. “Two five-year terms, ten years in power, it’s huge, it’s tiring, it’s stressful and it’s healthy to have to leave, analyzed the former President of the Republic. So the argument that we no longer have power because we can’t represent ourselves, what a curious argument… (…) In this case, there is always a last mandate. In this case, you put the president for life!»
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“If we stay too long, it’s dangerous”
While the former President of the National Assembly Richard Ferrand was already offended by this limitation to two presidential terms in June in an interview with Figaro , Nicolas Sarkozy persists and signs. “Power is dangerous, it’s a drug because you give everything when you’re in power. If you don’t stay long enough, it’s too short. But if you stay too long, it’s dangerous. Quickly, you think that no one would do better than you“, also argued the former tenant of the Élysée. Who took as an example, as he is used to, the hasty departure of Margaret Thatcher in 1990, victim of a plot from her own Conservative party. “She doesn’t‘heard nothing and she was the last to know.»