Luc Frieden named lead CSV candidate

Frieden will have the difficult task of leading the country's largest party to victory on 8 October. The CSV hopes to finally be in a position to form a government again, after nearly ten years on the opposition benches.

"The decision was unanimous", said Claude Wiseler after the vote on Wednesday evening. "We suggested the best candidate to lead our list in these difficult times in Europe. He is the head of the list, surrounded by a whole team."

Luc Frieden promised that "in order to fully fulfill my new duty and to make the CSV emerge as the largest faction in the parliament after the elections, I will leave all my mandates by the end of April at the latest. I will leave the Chamber of Commerce again this month, then Eurochambers, and my mandate at BIL."

The CSV lead candidate confirmed that he gave his approval to fill the role as early as "mid-January" and that he is "giving up all income" during his campaign, relying "on the kindness of his wife" and "his savings" to live.

He further noted that he entered the election battle "because I love this country. And when you love a country, you have to be ready to commit yourself to it."

In the eyes of Frieden, "the CSV, as a large party of the centre, is called upon to make concrete proposals to develop a social state with companies that can continue developing and so that society can continue developing in an inclusive manner."

Frieden also used the opportunity to criticise the DP-LSAP-Greens coalition: "The three parties have no air left. They are blocking each other."

Meeting in a scout chalet in Cents on Wednesday evening, the national party council, which unites around one hundred leading representatives from the CSV, accepted the proposal. After a long phase of "very sensitive" internal consultation, the two presidents of the party, Claude Wiseler and Elisabeth Margue, settled on the name Luc Frieden. The party congress still has to approve this nomination on 25 March.

© Maurice Fick / RTL 5minutes

Absent for ten years

Frieden has thereby made his return to politics through the front door. At the beginning of 2014, the former Minister of Finance, Justice and Defence of successive Juncker governments (from 1998 to 2013), threw in the towel in the Chamber of Deputies.

Following the 2013 legislative elections, he found himself on the opposition benches after the CSV was pushed out of power by the DP-LSAP-Greens coalition, which is showing signs of friction at the end of their second legislative period.

A little less than ten years later, most of which Frieden spent in the private sector, the CSV puts all their hopes into the candidacy of the former politician, who will turn 60 in September.

A lawyer and graduate of Harvard and Cambridge, Frieden has chaired the Board of Directors of BIL since March 2016. Since April 2019, he has been president of the Chamber of Commerce and since October 2021, president of Eurochambres, the association of European chambers of commerce and industry. He assumed the position of vice president of Deutsche Bank in London in 2019 and president of the Saint-Paul Luxembourg Group in 2016.