France entered the final stretch of legislative elections on Wednesday, which could result in the far right coming to power or in a coalition between the left, centre and centre-right, unprecedented in the country’s political culture.
Four days before the second round, the political landscape is more unpredictable than ever, with strong momentum in favor of the National Rally (RN, far right) of Jordan Bardella, who dreams of forming the first far-right government in France since the Second World War.
“Today, there is a bloc in a position to have an absolute majority in the National Assembly, it is the extreme right,” warned Emmanuel Macron’s Prime Minister, Gabriel Attal. On Sunday, “either power will be in the hands of a far-right government, or power will be in Parliament. I am fighting for this second scenario.”
Of the 311 triangular races – three candidates qualified for the second round – resulting from the first round won by the far right, two-thirds were the subject of withdrawals from the left-wing parties, the Republican right and the centre-right, with the aim of complicating the election of RN candidates.
The devices are thus trying to overcome their reluctance and contradictions to beat the extreme right. But they must also convince the voters and will do so during a first “special broadcast” on Wednesday evening on the BFMTV channel and Thursday evening on France 2.
The French political chessboard imploded with the dissolution of the National Assembly by French President Emmanuel Macron, and the first round, on June 30, which placed the RN ahead of the left-wing alliance of the New Popular Front (NFP).
Most seat projections predict that the RN and its allies will struggle to reach an absolute majority (289 deputies), reinforcing the hypothesis of a three-bloc scenario (extreme right, left, Macronists), which could make the country ungovernable as it prepares to host the Olympic Games.
“Paralyze the country”
“The political class is giving an increasingly grotesque image of itself,” mocked Marine Le Pen, a leading figure of the extreme right, who is considering a government with a relative majority, supplemented by various supporters. In an interview with the daily Le FigaroMr. Bardella denounced anti-RN alliances intended to “paralyze the country”, saying he was “ready to lend a helping hand” to “expand his majority”.
He tried to minimize the impact of revelations tarnishing his party’s shady figures, including a candidate wearing a cap with a swastika and a septuagenarian convicted in 1995 for armed hostage-taking. “When there are black sheep – and there can be some, by the way – I don’t have a trembling hand. Indeed, I wanted to withdraw the nomination,” he said.
On the other hand, there is little harmony between the disparate forces, which were still fiercely adversaries last month.
If they manage to prevent the RN from winning, the Macronists, part of the left and certain elected officials from Les Républicains (LR, right) will have the difficult task of building a “technical government” based on a “grand coalition”, common in many countries but foreign to French traditions.
The leader of the Ecologists and rising figure of the left Marine Tondelier summed up the challenge with a formula: “do things that no one has ever done before”. The former Prime Minister Édouard Philippe (centre-right) indicated for his part that he would vote for a communist, whose “democratic demands” he praised.
Macron silenced
But the veneer does not seem thick behind deep mutual distrust. “There will never be a government of national unity, it is excluded in view of the gap between the right and the left,” asserted a Socialist Party elected official.
The radical left of La France Insoumise (LFI), the most powerful party in the NFP but also the most divisive, has explicitly ruled out participating in a coalition.
On Wednesday, Emmanuel Macron hammered home in the Council of Ministers that there was “no question” of “governing” with LFI. “Withdrawing today for elected officials from the left in the face of the National Rally does not mean governing tomorrow with LFI,” he declared, according to several participants.
But his word no longer carries weight since he took, almost alone, the decision to call elections which turned into a rout for his camp.
Expected at the NATO summit in Washington next week, the head of state also seems weakened on the international scene which is scrutinizing these elections in one of the pillars of the European Union.