(PARIS) The French rallied strongly on Sunday for the second round of historic legislative elections, from which a far-right party could win but without an absolute majority in the assembly, risking a shutdown.
The voter turnout at 6 am on Sunday was 26.63%.
The country is grappling with a damaging climate marked by insults, physical attacks on candidates and posters, and racist and anti-Semitic rhetoric.
30,000 police officers, including 5,000 in Paris, will be mobilized in the face of possible violations on Sunday evening.
“There is a lot of tension, people are going crazy,” commented Laurence Abbott, a 66-year-old retiree in Tourcoing (north), who fears violence in the evening after the results are announced.
Photo by Mohammad Batra, Reuters
A woman casts her ballot at a ballot box in Le Touquet-Paris-Plage, northern France.
A few kilometers away in Lille, Cecil Ortiz, a 59-year-old senior executive, worried about the “polarization of public opinion”, while retired at 72 in Rosheim, a small town near Strasbourg (east). Age, he says “anguished”: “We are at a turning point in the history of the Republic”.
Tightening of three blocks
Polls opened at 2 a.m. (Eastern Time) on Sunday in mainland France, while voters in Saint-Pierre and Miquelon (North Atlantic), Guyana, the Antilles and Polynesia and New Caledonia in the South Pacific.
In major metropolitan areas, it will be open until 2 PM (Eastern Time), when the first estimates are released.
The first results fell in some foreign territories, which in no way considered the national trend. In Guadeloupe, four outgoing independents and leftist representatives return to their seats. Leftists won in Martinique and Guyana.
President Emmanuel Macron plunged France into the unknown by deciding on June 9 to dissolve the National Assembly after its defeat in European elections.
Photo by Mohammed Batra, Agence France-Presse
President Emmanuel Macron votes in Le Touquet, northern France.
In the first round, it put the French far-right National Rally (RN) party – and its allies from the right-wing Les Républicains party – (33%), ahead of the left-wing coalition Nouveau Front populaire (NFP). , 28%), and the center-right presidential camp (20%).
On Friday, opinion polls appeared to show a tight fit between the three blocs: the far-right would win 170 to 210 seats in the second round, with 289 deputies on course for an outright majority. They are followed by the NFP (155 to 185), followed by the Macronists (95 to 125).
“Populist Impulses”
But pollsters expressed a certain caution, because no one knows to what extent such high participation will be beneficial.
“Fifty constituencies are being played with pocket handkerchiefs,” argued Bryce Deintourier, vice president of polling firm Ipsos.
More than 200 candidates from left and center withdrew, dozens of triangles that appeared to favor the RN at the end of the first round, while turning out to be very close fights.
“The danger today is a majority dominated by the far right and that would be a disastrous plan,” warned Prime Minister Gabriel Atal, head of the presidential camp campaign.
Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-right, denounced the machinations of a “single party” by those “who want to retain power against the will of the people”.
If he wins his race and secures a sufficient majority, it is his 28-year-old Jordan Bartella who will enter Matignon with a strong anti-immigration plan. It was the first far-right government in France since World War II.
Photo by Christophe ENA, Associated Press
National Rally leader Marine Le Pen and party leader Jordan Bartella
The hypothesis has caused consternation among some of France’s key European allies, worried about the rise to power of Vladimir Putin’s Russia-friendly Eurosceptic party in one of the EU’s pillars.
Pope Francis warned Sunday against “ideological and populist temptations,” without naming any country in particular.
Such is the uncertainty that Gabriel Atal announced that his government was ready to ensure the continuity of the state “as long as necessary”. With Paris hosting the Olympic Games in three weeks, we have to deal with current affairs while waiting for a new team to form.
Asked about the possibility of the head of state’s speech after 8pm, his entourage told AFP that “nothing has been decided” and “everything”. [dépendrait] Results”.
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