PARIS, July 16: President Emmanuel Macron will accept the resignation of the French government on Tuesday, but ask Prime Minister Gabriel Attal to head up a caretaker administration for now, cabinet sources told AFP.
French politics have been in gridlock since an inconclusive snap election earlier this month, with parties in the National Assembly scrambling to put together a governing coalition and no successor to Attal in sight.
Macron made the announcement on Tuesday at the first cabinet meeting since his allies got roundly beaten in the snap parliamentary election he called to "clarify" the political landscape.
Macron told the ministers that he would accept Attals resignation "at the end of the day", but ask him to stay on "for some weeks", probably until after the Paris Olympics, which open on July 26, meeting participants said.
This gives political parties more time to build a governing coalition after the July 7 election runoff left the lower house without an overall majority.
A broad alliance called the New Popular Front (NFP) which includes Socialists, Communists, Greens and the hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) won the most seats, with 193 in the 577-strong lower chamber.
Macrons allies came second with 164 seats and the far-right National Rally (RN) third with 143.
The divided NFP alliance has been scrambling to come up with a consensus candidate for prime minister. —AFP
