French prime minister resigns

French Prime Minister Francois Fillon submitted his and his government's resignation and French President Nicolas Sarkozy has accepted them, Sarkozy's office said Saturday. The French constitution stipulates that if the PM steps down, the government has no head and is therefore resigned.

Source

I wonder why Fillon resign? This comes as a surprise to me and probably many others. The last sentence is also making me scratch my head. The government has no head and therefore resigns. Does that mean France has no real leadership now?

More information on the resignation.
Source
Still no reason as to why him and his government resigned.

French Prime Minister Francois Fillon and his government resigned on Saturday before a long-awaited ministerial reshuffle, according to a statement from President Nicolas Sarkozy's office.

Formality to a reorganization of his cabinet by Sarkozy.

French cabinet resigns ahead of Sarkozy reshuffle

The move, described by analysts as a formality, allows Mr Sarkozy to appoint new ministers without first having to dismiss those holding posts.

Government sources say Mr Fillon is likely to be reappointed prime minister, the AFP news agency reports.

Mr Sarkozy had previously indicated he would reshuffle his cabinet after controversial reforms to the country's pension system were passed by parliament.

The reforms were approved last month, but led to widespread protests.

Deny ignorance.

reply to post by Ferris.Bueller.II


I'm still not getting the picture. What does it mean a reshuffle in politics? I never heard that term before used in government.

reply to post by Romantic_Rebel


Here's an article from the 9th on it.

Sarkozy set to shuffle cabinet in coming days

PARIS--President Nicolas Sarkozy could reshuffle his cabinet as early as next week, government sources said on Tuesday, as he seeks to move on from an unpopular pension reform and look ahead to a 2012 election.

Sources say he will retain Francois Fillon, a capable ally who appeals to his core conservative electorate, as prime minister, and could bring in Alain Juppe, a former prime minister and heavyweight of the ruling centre-right UMP party.

Sarkozy is still fine-tuning his choices for ministries like finance and foreign affairs, the sources said, but will serve up a trimmer cabinet with a better gender balance and redraw some ministry lines as he aims to put a messy showdown with unions over pension reform behind him.

Sarkozy has been ruling the French government like an emperor, so Fillion's departure is unlikely to change much, since he was already his bureaucrat henchmen. They probably just gonna come up with a new puppet, or else Sarkozy is gonna declare the end of the Republic and the Fourth Empire (Fourth Reich?), or something, which would be the official way to assert his true authority.

In essence it means theirs a lot of infighting going on.
Maybe the protests had more effect than what they reported.Ha Ha popcorn time.

The talks with the unions did cause a lot of tension within the Sarkozy cabinet, triggering this reorganization. The Prime Minister in France is an appointed official, not elected, and thereby not that big of a deal. This is the same as if the President of the United States reorganizes his cabinet.

The protests got nothing to do with these changes.
They were long overdue according to specialists.
Thing is, Sarkozy wants at least 18 months to restore his image before the next elections.
For now, he's been using muppets, easy to control. But inside, his approval rates have been the lowest of the 5th republic.
He only just took presidency of the G20 which is heading towards massive failure anyway. But his plan is gonna be to pose himself as an international dude using his bilderberg connections and chosing better dudes for home politics, downside is he will have less control over them.
And his newly refitted plane, which we paid for, but really is a self propaganda tool.