For French President Emmanuel Macron, the first round of parliamentary elections in France last Sunday came as a shock. His party’s candidates lost support and the left alliance drew with their opponents. The runoff this Sunday (19) will be exciting as it is unknown whether Macron will win a majority in the National Assembly.
In the presidential elections to be held in April, it looked like France would have to decide between the center and the far right. Marine Le Pen finished second in the first round and declared war on the president. However, this picture changed after Macron’s re-election.
The far-right supporters of the National Regrouping are in third place. They are less regionally tied than other parties, but are already celebrating their results as they will have many more MPs in Paris than before.
But the new left alliance formed by socialists, communists, greens and the leftist protest party Unsubmissive France put pressure on the government. The election campaign, which for weeks seemed like a stand-alone boxing workout for the opposition, took an unexpected turn.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the leftist alliance Nova União Popular Ecológica e Social (Nupes), succeeded in inspiring and mobilizing young voters with pompous rhetoric.
Suddenly, Macron’s supporters saw that they had to fight. While polls show they will once again be the largest reserve in the National Assembly, it is not certain that they will have a governing majority with more than 289 votes. And the president’s camp is weakened by issues like a disastrous police operation at a European Cup game at the Stade de France or allegations of harassment against one of his ministers.
Why did Macron’s party fail?
In April, Macron was re-elected with 58 percent of the vote. Why does your party now only have a quarter of the votes? “There was no enthusiasm in this presidential election,” Olivier Rozenzweig, a political scientist at Sciences Po in Paris, tells DW.
Macron was chosen because there was no alternative because the far-right Marine Le Pen was his opponent.” Many would prefer to avoid a far-right president rather than vote for Macron.
Moreover, his supporters did not campaign at all in the weeks leading up to the elections, the new government was formed late, the candidates were chosen late. However, the normally fragmented left centered around one candidate for each constituency, which explains its success.
But Rozenzweig says that even if the president’s party does not win an absolute majority, Macron can continue to rule regardless of the outcome. “In France the Parliament cannot appoint the government”, so minority governments are also possible.
But if he wanted to pass a law, he would have to make concessions to the opposition parties anyway. “This is the irony of the political situation in France,” said the political scientist, adding that the new dimension of the left could lead Macron to tilt his reforms to the right and seek more compromise with the right.
Poison and bile in the last stretch
In several quick appearances this week, Macron once again called on voters to give the country a “solid majority” and warned against the political “disorganization” of the left’s plans. Its new prime minister, Elisabeth Borne, has called Mélenchon a “big liar” and Environment Minister Amélie de Montchalin sees the left as a “danger” for France and a threat to subjugate Russia.
Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire announced that the left alliance has proposed an economic project that will lead the country to “direct bankruptcy”.
Mélenchon said Macron was “chaos” and had turned France into a country “where you can no longer live”. He defended the left’s program and accused his opponents of playing the “fear card”.
Some economists at the Institut Montaigne think tank, for example, doubt the financial viability of Mélenchon’s plans. Their plans are very expensive, just lowering the minimum retirement age to 60 is estimated at 85 billion euros. Billions of dollars more must be poured into the healthcare system, minimum wage increases, and other social benefits.
In short, Mélenchon’s promises would dangerously increase the public debt in France.
What could happen?
Contrary to expectations, if the left alliance wins a majority, Macron may bid farewell to his reform plans, especially controversial pension reform.
The president would only have the power to dictate foreign and defense policy and would have to negotiate with the left alliance. Mélenchon is threatening to claim the post of prime minister, or at least some ministerial positions important to the left, for himself.
The last time such cohabitation took place was in 2002, between conservative president Jaques Chirac and socialist prime minister Lionel Jospin, and often leads to political stalemate.
If none of the main factions, neither Macron’s center party nor the left alliance wins a majority, this will make administration more difficult. The French political system does not have coalition-building mechanisms, and the president must either win a majority for each vote or persuade the parliamentarians one by one to switch sides.
On the other hand, if the president’s party regains a majority, Macron can continue with his political plans. However, the calm atmosphere in the National Assembly was to end.
A large left-wing bloc could always threaten him with street protests and the empowered far-right could oppress him on issues like immigration and crime. Whatever the outcome on Sunday night, the second term will be harder for Macron than the first.
source: Noticias
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