Left Leads French Election, Far-Right Comes Third
Date
7/7/2024 10:58:02 PM
(MENAFN- Gulf Times) France was on course for a hung parliament yesterday's election, with a leftist alliance unexpectedly taking the top spot ahead of the far-right, in a major upset that was set to bar Marine Le Pen's National Rally (RN) from running the government.
The result would mark a huge setback for the far-right, which opinion surveys ahead of the vote had projected would win comfortably, before the left and centrist alliances co-operated by pulling scores of candidates from three-way races to build a unified anti-RN vote.
The RN was set to come third, according to pollsters' projections based on early results.
In his first reaction, its leader Jordan Bardella called the co-operation between anti-RN forces, known as the“republican front” a“disgraceful alliance” that he said would paralyse France.
The election will leave parliament divided in three big groups with hugely different platforms and no tradition at all of working together. The vote was also a humiliation for President Emmanuel Macron, who called the snap election after his ticket was trounced in European Parliament elections last month. The leftist alliance, which gathers the hard left, the Socialists and Greens, who have long been at odds with each other, was forecast to win between 172 and 215 seats out of 577, according to the pollsters' projections. These projections are usually reliable.
Cries of joy and tears of relief broke out at the leftist alliance's gathering in Paris when the estimates were announced. At the Greens' headquarters activists screamed in joy, embracing each other.
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