French legislative elections 2022 : a flash report

by Multidimension Paris | Jun 29, 2022 | France Today

Multidimension desk
Written by: Parshi Barua

Photo: Shutterstock.com

In the legislative elections, the French voters elect 577 representatives to sit in the National Assembly, the lower house of the French parliament, for 5 years, which forms the legislative power with the upper house, The Senate. These two control the government and they propose, study et vote bills to make laws.

The first round of legislative elections took place on June 12, 2022. Polling stations were open from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. (8 p.m. in major cities). The rate of abstention was all time high at 52.49% compared to 51.29% in 2017.

Three parties came out on top:

Ensemble (Together)! the union of parties supporting President Emmanuel Macron obtained 25.75% of the votes and came first.

The NUPES (New Popular Union Ecological and Social), the union of left-wing parties led by Jean Luc Mélenchon ranked second with 25.66% of votes.

The National Rally, the party of Marine Le Pen, came 3rd with 18.88% of votes. These results were used only to calculate the cumulative votes casted in the first round and not for the composition of party wise seats in the National Assembly.

According to an Ipsos Sopra Steria poll, among the 18-25 years age group, 42% voted for the NUPES, 18% voted for the National Rally and 13% for the Ensemble!

Following the first round results, 5 candidates were declared elected, 4 from the NUPES and 1 candidate from the Ensemble, who received more than 50% of the total vote casted in their respective constituencies.

On June 19, 2022, the second round of legislative elections took place. According to figures published by the Ministry of the Interior, the abstention rose to 53.77% from 52.49% recorded in the first round.

In the second round, the Ensemble won 245 seats. The NUPES won 131 seats and the National Rally recorded an unprecedented score bagging 89 seats. The Republicans will be 61 in the National Assembly. As for the Union of Democrats and Independents, they managed to obtain 3 seats. Other parties have 48 seats. But no Reconquest candidate! (the party of Eric Zemmour) was elected.

On June 20, the elected deputies were welcomed to the National Assembly. June 21, 2022 marked the end of the term of the National Assembly elected in 2017 and on Tuesday, June 28, the first session of the elected Assembly will take place as well as the election of the President of the National Assembly.

As the presidential union Ensemble failed to acquire an absolute majority, it will need coalition partners to form the next government. A lot of challenges ahead.

French Presidential Elections 2022 : Towards A New Era Of Political Cohabitation?

by Multidimension Paris | May 14, 2022 | France Today

Multidimension Desk
Photo : Shutterstock.com

The first round of 2022 presidential elections took place on April 10. There were twelve candidates in the contest including the current president Emmanuel Macron, Marine Le Pen, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, Eric Zemmour, Yannick Jadot, Valérie Pécresse, Jean Lassalle, Fabien Roussel, Anne Hidalgo, Nicolas Dupont-Aignan, Philippe Poutou and Nathalie Arthaud. The results were announced at 8 pm. Emmanuel Macron topped the list with 27.84% of votes, Marine Le Pen came second with 23.15% of votes followed closely by Jean-Luc Mélanchon with 21.95% of votes.

After the announcement of the results, Jean-Luc Mélenchon of La France Insoumise (France Unbowed), a traditional leftist, called on his voters not to vote for Marine Le Pen in any circumstances. Valérie Pécresse, the candidate from the right, The Republicans, appealed to her voters to vote for Emmanuel Macron, so did Anne Hidalgo of the Socialist Party and Yannick Jadot of Europe Ecology – The Greens. On the other hand, Eric Zemmour and Nicolas Dupont-Aignan, both representing the extreme right-wing camp, declared their support for Marine Le Pen.

According to the statistics, the French between 18 to 24 years and 25 to 34 years voted mostly for Jean-Luc Mélenchon whose election manifesto, A Different World is possible, focussed on betterment of living conditions of common people, like increase in minimum wages, bringing back retirement age to 60, intensive investment in public service institutions especially hospitals along with the proposition to move the French State towards the 6th Republic for a real democracy (Citizens’ initiative referendum -RIC, dismissal of elected representatives) and new rights in the Constitution (right to control over one’s own body, right to die with dignity).

The second round took place on April 24, 2022. Emmanuel Macron is re-elected with 59% of the votes and Marine Le Pen collected 41% of the votes. In spite of popular discontentment against Emmanuel Macron due to his neo-liberal economic policy, tax cut for the riches and raising retirement age from 62 to 65, he came out victorious as a result of common good sense of the majority of the French electorate who rejected the extreme right-wing programmes of Marine Le Pen based on anti-European Union rhetoric, anti-immigration, racism and xenophobia. Although her significant progress in narrowing the margin of votes shows gradual change in French society which is hailed globally for its inclusiveness being multiethnic and multicultural. Therefore, Emmanuel Macron has to carry much more responsibility to address the discontentment of the population than his first term as president as his election in 2017 is regarded as a watershed in French politics being a young and energetic leader of a newly founded political movement of “neither left nor right”, unknown to the French population at that period of time.

The programme of his second term as president will largely depend on the outcome of the election of the lower house of the French Parliament which is scheduled on June 12, 2022 (first round) and June 19, 2022 (second round). Last time, blurring the left–right divide, his party managed an overwhelming majority by winning 308 seats out of 577 parliamentary seats. But the growing clout of Jean-Luc Mélenchon and Marine Le Pen in the French political scenario will definitely change the existing composition and put pressure on the political and the economic agenda of Emmanuel Macron.

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