Far Right Wins First Round Of Snap Polls In France; Major Blow To Emmanuel Macron (image@EmmanuelMacron)
The centrist forces of France’s President Emmanuel Macron faced a major blow after the first round of the legislative elections. Macron’s party came third while his major rival, the far-right National Rally (NR) party of Marine Le Pen came first.
The party appears all poised to win absolute majority of seats in the second round of the new National Assembly. The second round of the election is scheduled on July 7. If the party wins, Le Pen’s protégé, Jordan Bardella (28) would become the Prime Minister.
Emmanuel Macron stun the country, and even some of his allies by calling for a snap polls, after the RN trounced Macron’s centrist forces in European Parliament election this month. However, the snap polls might backfire. If Macron’s alliance win smaller minority contingent in the parliament, it would make him a far less powerful figure for the remaining three years of his term.
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Projections from prominent French polling firm gave the RN party 33.2 to 33.5 percent of vote, in comparison with the 28.1 to 28.5 percent of votes to the left-wing New Popular Front alliance, and 21.0 to 22.1 percent for Macron’s centrist camp.
The polling agencies suggest that this would give RN party a majority of seats in the 577-seat National Assembly after the second round. It appears that the party would smoothly bag the 289 seats needed for an absolute majority.
The projections varied sharply, The Ipsos forecast 230-280 seats, Ifop 240-270 seats. Elable was the only organization that put Macron’s party in the range of absolute majority by forecasting 260-310 seats.
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Macron called for a “broad” alliance against the far right part in the second round. The second round will see a run-off votes as there was no outright winner in the first round.
The leftwing alliance and the president’s camp now hopes that the tactical voting would prevent the RN candidates from winning seats leaving it short of winning absolute majority. The Prime Minister of the country, Gabriel Attal, who is most likely to be forced to resign after the second round said that the far right group is now at the “gates of power”.
