The campaign for the legislative elections in France enters its home stretch on Sunday, a week before a ballot threatened by a very large abstention from the French.
Without a state of grace and accused by the opposition of inertia since his re-election on April 24, President Emmanuel Macron ended up committing to two trips on Tuesday and Thursday and an interview in the regional press, to call on the French to choose a “stable and serious majority”.
He said he wanted to bring together immediately after these legislative elections in two rounds, on June 12 and 19, the political, economic, social, associative forces of the country but also citizens drawn by lot to launch his reforms affecting purchasing power, ecology, institutions and retreats.
Given in the lead in the polls, the coalition he has formed hopes to retain an absolute majority in the new National Assembly which, together with the Senate, holds the legislative power.
Mr. Macron and his centrist allies are however under pressure from an alliance of left-wing parties grouped behind Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
At 70, the leader of the radical left, who came third in the presidential election, is trying to transform the ballot into a “third round”.
This unprecedented alliance called New Popular Ecological and Social Union (Nupes) brings together socialists, communists, environmentalists and the party of Mr. Mélenchon, France insubordinate.
According to a recent Ifop poll, the presidential majority (Together!) would come out on top in number of seats at the end of the second round (275-310 seats), but without certainty of obtaining an absolute majority of 289 seats.
It would be ahead of the Nupes which could reach between 170 and 205 seats, ahead of the right-wing opposition (LR) and the party of Marine Le Pen (RN).
On the side of the presidential majority, we are assured of “taking seriously” this rise in power of the Nupes.
Behind, a third block is formed around the far-right candidate, Marine Le Pen, who was to try to galvanize her troops during a meeting on Sunday in Hénin-Beaumont, her stronghold in northern France.
The presidential finalist is carrying out a half-hearted campaign, having even taken the victory of the Macron camp for granted.
“False dish”
The French are called upon to renew the entire National Assembly, ie 577 deputies.
From this weekend, French Polynesia and the French residing abroad went to the polls for the first round, with results expected Sunday evening or Monday.
But, according to a BVA poll published on Friday, only 38% of French people said they regularly follow the electoral campaign. This was, moreover, parasitized by controversies including the fiasco of the organization of the final of the Champions League, last Saturday at the Stade de France.
A lack of interest that raises fears of low participation.
Even more than in the presidential election on April 24, abstention is expected at a record level for a first round of legislative elections (52 or 53% according to the polls against 51.3% in 2017).
The French “very clearly have their minds elsewhere”, said polling expert Brice Teinturier on Thursday, noting that “there is not really a campaign that has been built”.
It is not for lack of stakes when the French express in all the opinion polls their concern at the slowdown in the economy and the soaring food and energy prices caused by the war in Ukraine.
The French government just formed a few weeks ago is procrastinating, its hands tied by the electoral calendar. Especially since several of its members, including Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne, are candidates and are playing their own political future.
“There is always a false dish after the presidential election”, relativizes however the leader of the deputies of the presidential party LREM, Christophe Castaner, in the Journal du Dimanche, castigating the program of Nupes, “all the clichés of the Soviet world ” according to him.