TIL Desk/World/Paris/ New French President Emmanuel Macron is set to name a prime minister and visit German Chancellor Angela Merkel on his first full day in office.
The 39-year-old centrist leader laid out his ambitious plans for France as he took power yesterday, promising to restore France’s shattered self-confidence and help rebuild the flagging European Union.
His choice of prime minister will be crucial for the first task, with the 46-year-old centre-right Edouard Philippe from the Republicans party seen as the favourite for the job.
Picking him would send a clear signal that Macron hopes to attract other young modernisers from the Republicans to his new centrist party, Republic on the Move (REM), which will contest parliamentary elections in June.
“If the prime minister comes from the right, Emmanuel Macron will be able to attack the parliamentary elections by dynamiting the right, in the same way he has done to the left,” political expert Philippe Moreau-Chevrolet told.
