Leftist alliance leads French election: pollsters
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France is on course for a hung parliament, with a leftist alliance unexpectedly taking the top spot in the election ahead of the far right, in a major upset that was set to bar Marine Le Pen’s National Rally from running the government.
The early projections put President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist alliance in second place and the far right in third.
The outcome, if confirmed, will leave parliament divided in three big groups with hugely different platforms and no tradition at all of working together.
That could potentially herald a period of instability, unless the left manages to strike a deal with other parties to work together.
France now faces the prospect of weeks of political machinations to determine who will be prime minister and lead the National Assembly.
And Macron faces the prospect of leading the country alongside a prime minister opposed to most of his domestic policies.
The timing of France’s leap into the political unknown could hardly be worse: with the Paris Olympics opening in less than three weeks, the country will be grappling with domestic instability when the eyes of the world are upon it.
Macron took a huge gamble in dissolving parliament and calling for the elections after his centrists were trounced in European elections on June 9.
The snap elections in this nuclear-armed nation will influence the war in Ukraine, global diplomacy and Europe’s economic stability, and they’re almost certain to undercut Macron for the remaining three years of his presidency.
The leftist alliance was forecast to win between 172 and 215 seats out of 577, pollsters’ projections based on early results from a sample of polling stations showed.
These projections are usually reliable.
The result would in any case be humiliating for Macron, whose centrist alliance, which he founded to underpin his first presidential run in 2017, was projected to be narrowly second and win 150-180 seats.
But it will also be a major disappointment for Le Pen’s nationalist, eurosceptic National Rally (RN).
The RN, which had for weeks been projected to win the election, was seen getting 115 to 155 seats.
The first official results were expected later on Sunday, with the results from most, if not all, constituencies likely to be in by the end of the day or the early hours of Monday.
Voters have punished Macron and his ruling alliance for a cost of living crisis and failing public services, as well as over immigration and security.
Le Pen and her party have successfully tapped into those grievances, spreading their appeal way beyond their traditional strongholds along the Mediterranean coast and in the country’s northern rust belt.
But the left-wing alliance managed to edge them out of the first spot.
That was in part thanks to some limited cooperation by Macron’s centrist Together alliance and the left, designed to block the far right’s ascendancy to power.
Le Pen’s rivals pulled more than two hundred candidates out of three-way races in the second round in a bid to create a unified anti-RN vote.
The constitution says there can be no new parliamentary election for another year, so an immediate repeat vote is not an option.
More than 49 million people were registered to vote in the elections, which will determine which party controls the 577-member National Assembly, France’s influential lower house of parliament, and who will be prime minister.
Earlier Sunday, Le Pen has reprimanded soccer star Kylian Mbappé for his public call to French voters to snub her far-right National Rally party and stop them winning the second round of parliamentary elections.
The French are tired of being lectured and advised on how to vote,” Le Pen told CNN.
She added: “Mbappé does not represent French people from an immigrant background, because there are many more of them who live on the minimum wage and cannot afford housing and heating than people like Mr Mbappé.”
The Real Madrid player has repeatedly commented on the political situation in his home country during UEFA Euro 2024, with France set to face Spain in the semi-final in Munich on Tuesday.
“It’s a dicey situation. We must not allow our country to fall into the hands of these people,” said the 25-year-old.
with AP and Reuters
DPA
