President Emmanuel Macron was on the verge of losing his majority in the French National Assembly on Sunday night, after a strong prominence in the legislative elections by a green left-wing opposition alliance and an increase late far right.
The initial results and projections of the polling stations after the close of the polling stations showed that Macron’s centrist alliance Ensemble (Together) would be well below the 289 seats needed for a straight majority in the assembly. winning about 230 seats.
The green-left alliance formed by far-left politician Jean-Luc Mélenchon – the New Ecological and Social People’s Union (Nupes) – will become the main opposition party with about 150 seats.
Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally is the big surprise of the night and is expected to win nearly 90 seats, more than 10 times more than in the last legislative elections in 2017. Conservative Les Républicains and its partners about 80 are delivered, better than expected.
If the final results are confirmed, the result means that Macron will have to reach agreements with other parties in the National Assembly to pass a law for the next five years and his ministers will face a turbulent turn in parliamentary debates. .
“I will not hide the fact that these results, if confirmed, are far from what we expected,” Gabriel Attal, Macron’s Minister of Public Accounts, told TF1 television. “There is no absolute majority for any other party either, so it’s an unprecedented situation.”
Mélenchon told his applauding supporters that Macron had suffered a “total defeat” and that his alliance was the new face of France’s historic “elevations of rebellion and revolution.”
Jordan Bardella, the current chairman of Le Pen’s Eurosceptic and anti-immigration Rassemblement National party, said the RN had made “a historic breakthrough”, while a smiling Le Pen said the French were concerned about migrants, crime and injustice would now have a powerful group defending it. his interests in parliament.
Nupes de Mélenchon – which includes the French Socialist, Communist and Green parties, as well as its own far left La France Insoumise (France without inclination) – will, by convention, chair the crucial finance committee of the assembly after replace Les Republicains as the main opposition party. .
However, Macron’s Ensemble alliance appears to have won more seats than any other in the assembly, meaning the president will likely be spared unproductive “cohabitation” with a majority-imposed government and prime minister. hostile parliamentarian.
As President of the Fifth Republic established under Charles de Gaulle in 1958, he also retained control of national defense and foreign policy.
Macron and his Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne will, however, have to forge a coalition agreement or temporary agreements with other parties – probably the Conservative LR – to pass new laws.
This includes Macron’s next round of economic reforms, including his plan to simplify the costly pension system and raise the official retirement age to 65 from today’s 62, a proposal strongly opposed by the left and answers the major unions.
In April, Macron defeated Le Pen in the last round of the presidential election to become the first president in 20 years to win a second term. But now it seems very likely that he will also be the first since 2002 to fail to get a majority in the National Assembly after his own election.
The left demanded several scalps from Macron’s team, with Nupes’ candidates defeating Christophe Castaner, a former interior minister who has been Macron’s party leader in the assembly, and Richard, among others. Ferrand, outgoing president of the assembly.
It is also likely that some of Macron’s ministers will lose their jobs according to his rule that ministers running for office and losing should resign. Health Minister Brigitte Bourguignon lost by 56 votes to a far-right candidate in northern France. In a constituency on the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe, Sea Minister Justine Benin was beaten by a left-wing rival.