Although all indications were that the leader of the united left would finish - albeit with a short head start - first in the first round, Macron managed to cut the "thread" first by a "handful" of votes, in a first round that saw a record 52.8% abstention rate in France's post-war history.
Specifically, Macron's "Together" party garnered 25.75% of the vote against 25,66% of Melanson's "People's Union",[/B] who nevertheless maintained a slender lead (25.6% to the French president's 25.2%) until Macron gained ground just before the photo-finish.
Results of the first round
Macron leads in seats, but absolute majority is threatened
Although Macron's coalition is expected to remain the leading force in France, the first round of elections was marked by the strong rise of the united left, but also of the far right, according to the French News Agency (AFP).
One will have to wait for the second round next Sunday to see whether or not Emmanuel Macron, who was re-elected on April 24 for a second five-year term, will be able to maintain an absolute majority and, beyond that, his ability to freely implement his controversial reform policies.
However, the rise of Mélenchon's coalition is unlikely to translate into a simple majority in the 577-seat National Assembly, as moderate voters are expected to support the Macron faction next Sunday. Macron's party and his allies are expected to secure between 265 and 304 seats and a lead, according to the average estimates of four polling institutes after the first round of elections, while 289 seats are needed for an absolute majority.
However, the second strongest party in the French National Assembly will by all accounts be Nupes, the alliance of left-wing parties led by Mélenchon, with 163 to 207 seats; Marine Le Pen's far-right National Rally is expected to secure between 17 and 36 seats, while the right-wing Republicans and their allies are expected to secure at least 33.
"A very serious warning was sent to Macron.An absolute majority is far from certain," says political scientist Brice Tenturier.
Lessons from the first round
Apart from the warning to President Macron, the main lessons drawn from the election are thespectacular rise of an alliance of left-wing parties around Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the strong rise of the far-right party of Marine Le Pen and the collapse of the traditional right, as well as the record abstention, according to Agence France-Presse.
The "Together" coalition of the French president and his centrist allies is reportedly winning between 275 and 310 seats, according to a projection by Ifop-Fiducial, and 255 to 295 seats according to Ipsos. The absolute majority in the National Assembly is 289 seats (out of a total of 577).
In terms of votes, Jean-Luc Melanson's radical left-wing "Nupes" alliance garnered between 25 and 26.2% of the vote compared to 25 to 25.8% for the "Together" coalition, with the two factions fighting a neck-and-neck battle.
However, more than one in two voters did not go to the polls on Sunday, a new record that underlines the indifference of the French to a vote overshadowed by the presidential election.
Estimates for the second round
Attention now turns to the second round, where analysts and pollsters expect the "Together" party, which is close to President Emmanuel Macron, to win the most seats.
They also agree that left-wing alliance leader Mélenchon will probably not achieve his goal of being "elected" prime minister, since he will not secure an absolute majority in the National Assembly that will emerge in the second round of elections to be held next Sunday, and that re-elected president Emmanuel Macron is unlikely to achieve his own goal, which is to have an absolute majority
in the French National Assembly.
Both sides hope, however, that next Sunday the abstention rate will be lower, hoping that this will be to their advantage.
One of the questions ahead of the second round of the parliamentary elections is what position will be taken by the parties in the regions that will not have their own candidate in the second round.
The stakes of the elections
The outcome of the parliamentary elections is important for Macron, as it will determine whether he can implement his plans in his second term.
For this he needs a majority in parliament and if he only secures a relative majority, the French president and his government will be forced to seek support from other camps. It is likely that there will then be a minority government which, depending on the bills to be passed, will try to rely on centre-left or centre-right forces.
Despite the dissatisfaction of many voters with his first term in office, Macron has benefited from the fact that the parliamentary elections in France were seen as a confirmation of the presidential election. The downside for the left-wing alliance was that general interest in the election was low and Macron entered the campaign late and gave it little opportunity to attack him."
Melanchon: "The presidential party has been defeated"
"The truth is that the presidential party has been defeated," Jean-Luc Mélenchon said Sunday night, calling on his forces to "break out" in the second round of parliamentary elections.
The first-round result represents a "unique opportunity," he had said earlier, when polls closed and the first exit polls were announced. And he called on supporters of the left-wing alliance to turn out en masse at the polls next Sunday to reject Macron's programme. The left alliance needs 185 seats to be able to call for referendums and parliamentary inquiries and put the brakes on government work with long debates on bills and proposals for amendments. "They could prevent Macron from sleeping at night," reckons Martin Kenzes of the German Marshall Fund in Paris."
However, Mélenchon may be affected by a lack of a second-round vote pool and strong turnout particularly among young people and the working class, according to experts.
Le Pen's stance on the second round
Marine Le Pen, for her part, said she was urging her voters not to take sides in the Macron or Mélenchon dilemma.
The Macron-affiliated party said that in constituencies where a Mélenchon-affiliated candidate is pitted against a candidate affiliated with Le Pen "will judge on a case-by-case basis".
Of course, the head of the far-right National Rally, Marine Le Pen, hailed her party's performance in the first round of the parliamentary elections, calling it a "historic" result.
Call for participation in the second round of French elections
At the same time, an appeal to voters to go to the polls in the second round of next Sunday's parliamentary elections was made by both Prime Minister Elisabeth Bourne on behalf of Emmanuel Macron's presidential majority and the leader of the People's Union Jean-Luc Mélenchon as the first round was marked by a record abstention rate of close to 53%.
"Today, more than one in two French people did not go to the polls. Our first collective task is to reduce abstention. We will continue to work in this direction by continuing the dialogue with all of society," said Bourne.
"To all those who abstained, I want to say tonight to believe in the power of their vote and make their voices heard next Sunday. We are the only political force that can take a majority in the National Assembly. We have a week of mobilization ahead of us, a week to convince," the Prime Minister also went on to say: "I therefore call on all democratic forces to rally around our candidates. In one week, it is our values that are at stake, freedom, equality, fraternity and the secular nature of the state."
For his part, the leader of the French left Melanson said that "at the end of this first round, the New People's Ecological and Social Union (Nupes) came out on top. It will be present in more than 500 constituencies in the second round."
"The truth is that the presidential party, at the end of the first round, was defeated and for the first time in the Fifth Republic, a newly elected president did not manage to obtain a majority in the parliamentary elections that followed," Melanson said, and went on to say the following: "I call on our people, in view of this result and the extraordinary opportunity it gives us for our personal lives and for the destiny of our common country, to go to the polls next Sunday. Let us reject once and for all the destructive projects of Macron's majority."
Source: iefimerida.gr
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