PARIS- France, on Tuesday, started the process of forming a new government after President Emmanuel Macron’s decision to dissolve parliament and call for fresh elections to reorder the political landscape failed to produce a clear majority for any party.
Leaders of the left-wing New Popular Front (NPF), which led in voting ahead of President Emmanuel Macron’s centrists and Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally (RN), were in hurry, promising they will be nominating a candidate for prime minister this week.
Many were delighted as supporters celebrated in eastern Paris at Le Pen’s defeat but none of these factions could hope to command an overall majority. This world power-house is now effectively without a working government just three weeks before it hosts the Olympics.
Prime Minister Gabriel Attal is expect to hand his resignation Monday morning and has also indicated that he is willing to oversee things while this period of political uncertainty continues. The Paris stock exchange opened 0.49 percent lower than last time.
“Is this the biggest crisis of the Fifth Republic?” Gael Sliman, president of polling group Odoxa said referring specifically to the period since 1958. “Emmanuel Macron wanted clarification with the dissolution, [but] we are totally uncertain. A very thick fog.”
French Socialists’ parties under NFP will choose either by ‘consensus or vote’ their candidate who would replace Attal as head of government later this month, according to Olivier Faure party leader. However, making such choice won’t be easy.
The largest part within NFP consists of Jean Luc Melenchon’s extreme-left France Unbowed (LFI)–a divisive figure scorned by both right and center and even alienating much of his own left flank – who would struggle to form alliances out with his own party, claims National Assembly member Mathilde Panot from LFI adding that it has become unthinkable if not impossible for anyone wanting prime minister except for the man who saved left-wing in France.
Panot told broadcaster LCI, “He is ‘absolutely not disqualified’.”
This has happened at a time when President Macron is preparing to be out of the country for most of this week while attending the NATO summit in Washington.
In fact, it will be difficult for any grouping to garner sufficient seats in parliament since no bloc would secure even half of that number. Therefore, it is unclear how feasible it will be to establish another government.
The aide said that Mr Macron would call for “prudence and analysis of results” and had not yet made any public statement as regards these projections.
‘Muddle’
It is only a week ago that some polls recommended that the RN could win an outright majority with its 28-year-old deputy, Jordan Bardella, becoming France’s next prime minister.
Rather, he got angry
Bardella described these arrangements as “an alliance of dishonour” which lead to the rise of anti-national front movements in certain sectors of the country.
He claimed it has thrown France to “extreme left” led by Jean-Luc Melenchon
Le Pen insisted that “The tide is rising…It did not rise high enough this time, but it continues to rise and therefore our victory was only postpone.”
Accordingly, can this last-minute union allow France to have a stable administration when she embarks on her next presidential campaign in 2027 with still large faction of RN lawmakers headed by Le Pen?
Risk consultancy Eurasia Group said there was ‘no obvious governing majority’ in the new parliament.
“It may be weeks before the confusion is cleared up and current business is being handled by this government.”
