Emmanuel Macron, the former economy minister who has vowed to shake up French politics, could launch a bid for the presidency as early as this month, his aides have suggested.



The 39-year-old one-time investment banker, who went from being an unknown adviser to François Hollande, to economy minister, before resigning from government, has had a meteoric rise to become one of France’s most popular political figures – despite belonging to no party and never having run for elected office.

His ambition to launch an outsider bid to become president, playing on the disillusionment towards conventional politicians and political parties, has been clear since he left the Socialist government at the end of August. But, while building up his new political movement, En Marche!, he has played a long game, feeding months of speculation over his intentions and whether or not he would run.

Will France's young economy minister – with a volunteer army – launch presidential bid? Read more

Macron will “declare his candidacy before 10 December” a member of his team told Agence France-Presse on Tuesday. “All the conditions are in place.”

Macron’s camp then played this down, saying only that he would make a decision on whether or not to run for president before 10 December, when he would hold a large rally in Paris.

Speeding up the launch of a possible presidential bid would allow Macron to exploit the deep divisions on the French left. The Socialist party is in disarray, with a recent poll showing only 4% of people were satisfied with Hollande. The party base is increasingly disillusioned and there are serious questions over whether Hollande, or anyone else from the Socialist party, could even make it into the final runoff of the presidential race next May.

The French presidential election is more open than any previously. Hollande is France’s least popular president since the second world war, and is expected to announce next month whether he will attempt a re-election bid that some predict is already doomed. Meanwhile, the far-right Front National’s Marine Le Pen is tipped to easily make it through to the final runoff.

The French right will choose its presidential candidate in a primary race at the end of this month. Alain Juppé, the pro-business and socially moderate mayor of Bordeaux, is the favourite to win ahead of the former president Nicolas Sarkozy, who has run an increasingly hardline campaign, veering towards the themes of the far right.

But it is the first time the right has held an open primary race to choose its candidate, making the turnout and result hard to predict. Juppé is currently rated France’s most popular politician, and Macron – who shares similar free-market reform ideas – is the second most popular.

Macron prides himself on his independence and belonging to no political party, saying it doesn’t matter he has never before run for elected office. He describes himself as of the left but keen to bring together people from across the whole spectrum, including the right. Polls show he is most popular among rightwing, older and professional voters. But pollsters have said Macron has his work cut out to expand his support base.

Only two years ago, when Macron was Hollande’s chief adviser in the Élysée Palace, he was totally unknown to the general public. The philosophy postgraduate and former Rothschild banker’s rise to government minister was so extraordinary and unconventional that he is still known as a “flying saucer” on the political scene.

Five years ago the notion that someone with no constituency or political party and no electoral experience could be a serious contender for the French presidency would have been unthinkable. But Macron – a pro-reformist, pro-business figure who served for two years in a Socialist government while insisting he was “neither left nor right” – has spent months building up financial and strategic backing for a presidential bid. He is seen as a product of the times: a non-politician wanting to take on politics. Yet, though he is a rebel, he is also a product of the establishment as a former minister and graduate of France’s top civil service school. He is seen as someone new, but a safe pair of hands.

As economy minister, Macron regularly launched scathing attacks on the left’s defining characteristics – from the 35-hour-week to the large public sector – and repeatedly criticised the discrimination and inequality that still defined France’s high-rise suburban estates. Not afraid of grand metaphors, Macron has likened his own rebellious streak to France’s 15th-century saint and saviour, Joan of Arc.

He has not yet set out his political platform – which he calls a mission to “transform France” – but he has spoken of the need to cure France of its “democratic malaise”, warning of people’s distrust of the political class.

He has often been intentionally cryptic and is expected to flesh out his ideas in a book this month. “France is a project, and that’s the project I want to take further,” he said at a rally in Montpellier last month.