The French government will not renew the contract of Henri Proglio as CEO of Electricité de France. The announcement was made by Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron. The government intends to replace Proglio, who has always been politically close to the centre-right, with the current CEO of Thales Jean-Bernard Lévy.
Officially, the reason for the non-renewal of the current CEO would be attributable to reasons of age: Proglio is already 65 years old and a possible five-year renewal would lead him to remain at the helm of EDF even after 67, the maximum age set by the group's statute for own Ad.
In any case, however, this decision confirms a certain opacity of the mechanisms that underlie the appointments of the top management of the state-owned companies and also seems to be linked to political reasons: as mentioned, Proglio has always been close to the centre-right and was appointed to lead of EDF by Sarkozy.
Lévy would find himself having to manage a particularly complicated moment for the French energy giant, which draws its strength (both inside and outside the borders) from nuclear reactors, through which it produces a large part of its energy. The government led by Hollande, however, intends to severely cut the contribution of nuclear power to energy production, with a decision that risks considerably reducing the weight of Edf, which also controls the Italian Edison, within the European scenario.
