Essential
A few days after his election as head of the Arize-Lèze intermunicipality, Laurent Panifous, minister and also municipal councilor in the town of Fossat, wants to play a complete role in the development of his native territory.
“I have always brought Ariège with me, and I have always done everything to try to help my territory.” Until his position as minister in charge of relations with parliament, which he has held since October 2025, Laurent Panifous does not intend to let go of his home department.
On Thursday, April 2nd, the community council of the Arize-Lèze intermunicipality elected, with a large majority, the government member of Sébastien Lecornu as president of the community. “I did not expect to be almost unanimously elected,” confesses the new president. The result surprises him because he has taken on a now national role, known to all in his political career.
“I could have understood if there were a few abstentions. My election is not neutral. I have been a national elected official for a few years, I was president of a group, I am a member of the government…I have been touched and even more happy to know that I am well received at home,” he says.
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A minister who returns to his roots
Locally, it is a small event. If Laurent Panifous claims that he has wanted to keep a foot in Ariège since entering the government, the presence of a minister at the head of a community council is quite exceptional, even if the elected president has already held this position from 2017 to 2022.
Laurent Panifous explains this accumulation of mandates (he is also a municipal councilor in the town of Fossat) with a deep desire.
“Being a local elected official, for someone who operates at the national level, is something that can often be missing, and I needed it, I wanted it. But there was a condition for that, it was a collective project.”
Health, economy, early childhood… Issues to address
With his recent experience as a government member, but also his knowledge of the northwest territory of Ariège, Laurent Panifous plans to focus on several essential daily subjects.
He details what he expects in the coming months, starting with health. “These are major structural projects that we launched six years ago here, in Arize-Lèze, around health, with health centers. It works very well today, but the work is not finished around health. There is also the issue of supporting the little ones, with the nurseries we developed, which we have just completed in Lezat in particular,” reveals Laurent Panifous.
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Great economic ambitions
The minister also wants to invest in the economy and the attractiveness of the territory.
“There is the question of economic development, which will be a priority in the years to come, that is, how to welcome or allow companies to develop. Because we have a major challenge, it is to ensure that there is employment in our territory, to allow people who live here to work here and not have to commute too far, and that is the condition for our territory to develop,” explains the president of the intermunicipality.
The goal in the long run is to have an influence on other subjects. “Thanks to these resources that we would create, we can then finance our more social, more solidarity projects, health, I also think especially of the agricultural sector, which is going through difficult times, so there is the issue of economic development in the very broad sense, in all its aspects, no matter how different they may be, and it is a priority for the community,” Laurent Panifous presents, launching into a third term and creating an unusual bridge between the government and the Ariège territories.
