The poll suggested that Front National is now getting votes from a wide cross-section of French society and it might no longer be fair to label party’s support base as stereotypical EuropeanFar-Right.
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Marine Le Pen, the leader of France’s National Front (FN), has condemned opponents for colluding to prevent it winning a single region in elections.
The conservatives though surged against the governing Socialists, winning seven constituencies to the Socialists’ five, changing the political map of France.
This election proves the FN is still steadily building on the progress it has made even since before Marine Le Pen became leader in January 2011. Le Pen lost by a landslide in the second round of voting, with 82% of the vote going to Chirac.
While early analyses prophesied that a Socialist candidate would face a rout in the 2017 presidential elections, this regional ballot showed that the story is far from written.
And since Marine Le Pen represents the “courageous and determined patriots”, defeat is never her party’s fault.
Instead, she was the victim of a conspiracy, she told her disappointed supporters.
Sarkozy’s Republicans and centre-right allies took 57.5% of the votes in the northern region, where Le Pen was standing, against her 42.5%, the Ifop Fiducial poll for iTELE, Paris Match and Sud Radio showed.
The conservatives were boosted to victory in the two Le Pen races with help from the Socialists who withdrew their candidates, asking voters to give their ballots to the mainstream rival.
The Socialists realized FN’s numbers in the first round would likely win it the election in the regions where it received above 40 percent of the votes. Yet in Sunday’s second round, voters from the left and the traditional right ganged up to deliver a series of defeats nationwide to the anti-European Union, anti-immigrant party.
The deft tact was costly for the Socialists – who got nothing in return from the conservative right and who will have no one on the leadership councils in those regions for six years. And most importantly, the National Front failed to obtain the majority in any of the 13 regions.
“Thank you and bravo for freeing yourselves from indecent (voting) orders, from smear campaigns decided in the golden palaces of the Republic and slavishly executed by those who live in this system and bloom on the Frenches’ backs”, said Marine Le Pen, stressing that her party will still be the first opposition party in the regional bodies. Never mind the big turnout Sunday. The figures weren’t updated. The second-round turnout at the same time five years ago was 43. The Republicans, headed by former President Nicolas Sarkozy, were undoubtedly encouraged by their victory Sunday, and the National Front has no reason to expect to outmaneuver the mainline parties if they unite against it again. That reflects a fear of allowing a party associated with extremism to take power. In truth, most agree that Sarkozy’s obsession to open a national debate on the French identity during his administration, in the hope of collecting support from the National Front backyard, alienated a significant part of the electorate. “There is no relief, no triumphalism, no message of victory”.
“France in moments of truth has always taken refuge in its real values”, Valls said. Or could it fuel enough anger over the party’s exclusion from mainstream politics to propel her through the “glass ceiling” she complains about?
“In its northern and southern bastions, we’ve eradicated the evil-doing Socialist Party”.
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While regional governments aren’t as politically powerful in France as in other countries, the vote had major symbolic importance, coming so soon after the Paris terrorist attacks.
