French conservative party meets to validate Ciotti's elimination
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00:00Certainly. Well here I am still outside the Republican Party's headquarters. We
00:04haven't got much news now. This is lunchtime here in France and we we do
00:08tend to find things begin to quieten down a little bit in the lunchtime
00:11period but things should heat up a bit more this afternoon. We are waiting to
00:14hear from the heavyweights in the Republicans Party who we understand are
00:18meeting by videoconference. They will be, they say they will be validating the
00:23exclusion of Eric Ciotti from the party. Yesterday they approved it. That's what
00:27we heard when they made that announcement yesterday. Today they will
00:30be validating it and they say the end is near. At the same time of course we have
00:36Eric Ciotti threatening legal action saying he was elected leader of this
00:40party. He is therefore still leader but in a counterbalance to that you'll have
00:45the heavyweights of the party coming back and saying what Eric Ciotti did
00:48unilaterally deciding to align himself with the far-right party of Marine
00:53Le Pen. That went against the party's statutes. It went against the party's
00:57internal rules and that therefore means that they can exclude him from the party.
01:02Claire you said things quietened down during lunchtime here in France. Not if
01:06you're Eric Ciotti who's sitting down for lunch with the far-right Jordan Bardella.
01:10What is Eric Ciotti trying to do here? Either he's digging in his heels with
01:14this in terms of seeking this alliance with the far-right or he's looking to
01:18jump ship. They quietened down in the sense that they're not coming out and
01:23making announcements to journalists because they are having lunch and
01:26discussing politics. That's what I mean when I say they quietened down. What we
01:30understand Eric Ciotti wants for instance in his constituency in the
01:33south of France in Nice, he is planning to run to become a member of Parliament
01:38there but the Republicans party will also be running a candidate there. We may
01:43see that in lots of different constituencies across France you might
01:46find a situation where we have the Republicans party running a candidate
01:50and Eric Ciotti running also candidates but kind of for the Republican parties
01:54but not really but therefore aligned to the far-right. So it'll come down to
01:58what the base wants, what the members of the party want. Do they want to vote for
02:02Eric Ciotti or a candidate who's in his camp who's therefore aligned to the
02:06far-right or do they want to vote for the traditional right-wing Republicans
02:11party who will not align themselves with the far-right. Eric Ciotti says he has
02:15the base, he believes the members are behind him. The party heavyweights say no
02:19no no we think we have the base, the base are behind us and we are following what
02:24they want out of us in the moment.