It takes a brave person to meddle with the map of France. Napoleon had a tinker with it in the early 1800s, reducing the number of small "communes", but even he stopped short of a wide-ranging administrative overhaul.

Over the centuries, others have struggled and been largely defeated by the depth and complexity, not to mention vested interests, of France's local government – nicknamed mille-feuille after the puff-pastry dessert of many layers and lashings of cream.

On Tuesday, President François Hollande, a man known to prefer consensus to conflict, entered the historic fray by announcing that he had redrawn the country's internal borders. In a bid to reduce France's notorious bureaucracy and save €15bn (£12.2bn), Hollande proclaimed that as of late 2015 – if parliament approves the measure – France will no longer be divided into 22 regions but 14 "super-regions". This, he hopes, will eliminate some of the overlapping responsibilities, red tape and wasteful costs and make life somewhat simpler for citizens and businesses alike.

"This is where we will learn who are the real reformers and who are the conservatives," Hollande had said in an earlier television broadcast announcing the measure.

It is a move many have proposed – including Hollande's centre-right predecessor, Nicolas Sarkoy – but none have put it into action until now in the face of local sensibilities and the determination of many regions to hang on to their historical and cultural identity.

France is currently made up of 22 regions, at least 100 departments, and more than 36,000 communes, each of which have their own elected officers and civil servants. While many agreed that the territorial reform was necessary, the proposal brought out the nimbys. One poll showed that while 68% of French people believe the measure to be a good thing, 77% did not want their own region to disappear.

Opponents included those in relatively rich Alsace, whose local laws date back to the time when it was part of Germany until 1918, at the end of the first world war. People there do not want to be lumped in with – or pay for – their much larger neighbour, Lorraine, a mining and steel region in decline. If the reform goes ahead, the two would be merged.

Demonstrations were held in Nantes in the Pays de la Loire calling for the region to be joined with Brittany, as it was until a 1956 reform. Bretons were less enthusiastic about the reunification. The proposal ended up pitting two political heavyweights against each other.

The defence minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, who had vehemently opposed the merging of his home region, the fiercely independent Brittany, with its neighbour, looks to have won this battle. The former prime minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, who fought equally fiercely for the two regions to be merged, appears to have been defeated. The Bretons are to remain on their own, and that is exactly what they wanted.

Le Figaro did not stint on the metaphors in its coverage of France's controversial administrative upheaval. The newspaper declared it "a forced-march reform, born with forceps … a reform finalised in extremis."

After some last-minute lobbying by what Le Figaro termed "local barons", the map unveiled on Tuesday pleased some as much as it disappointed others.

The council of ministers will examine the reforms on 18 June.