Macron demands ‘revolutionary’ government but few new faces

PARIS: French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday asked ministers to be “revolutionaries”, after a government reshuffle that left many of the same faces in place and raised doubts over gender equity and policy priorities.

“I don´t want ministers who administer, I want ministers who act,” Macron told the first cabinet meeting under France´s youngest-ever Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, people present told AFP. “I don´t want managers, I want revolutionaries,” he said.

Naming the young, articulate Attal to the premiership and freshening the ministerial roster is a bid by Macron to breathe new life into his flagging second term, hobbled by the lack of an absolute majority in parliament.

But many of the people sitting around the cabinet table for the new government´s first weekly meeting Friday were still firmly in the same seats as before the change.

Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin, Justice Minister Eric Dupond-Moretti and Defence Minister Sebastien Lecornu remained in place.