2024: The French president's annus horribilis
It’s been a busy year for President Emmanuel Macron: the world watched him preside over the Paris Olympics, D-Day commemorations and the reopening of Notre-Dame cathedral. But on the domestic front it’s been a veritable "annus horribilis" – marked by political turmoil, loss of influence and all-time low popularity.
A year ago, in his New Year televised address, President Macron announced a year of "French pride".
In some ways it delivered.
In June, France welcomed WWII veterans from the US, Canada, UK, and its former colonies to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Allied landings in Normandy, in what will likely be the last major ceremony in the presence of the men and women who freed France from Nazi rule.
Later that month, the Paris Olympics and Paralympics defied the naysayers and saw France pull off a spectacular opening ceremony on the River Seine, while fears over security and the capital grinding to a halt under the weight of millions of visitors failed to materialise.
And 2024 was bookended with spectacular images of Notre-Dame Cathedral rising from the ashes. The Gothic wonder reopened, more or less as Macron had promised, within five years after a devastating blaze.
Millions watched on as Macron gathered a host of international dignitaries including US president-elect Donald Trump and Ukraine’s Volodymr Zelensky under the same, albeit freshly painted, roof.
It would be economic, industrial, political, technological... even “biological”.
Read more on RFI English
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