(Paris) The new left-wing coalition in France detailed on Friday its program of “total rupture” for the legislative elections, negotiated at the price of compromises on Ukraine or the Middle East, the extreme right promising for its part a government of “national unity” in the event of victory in July.
After the rout of the presidential camp in the European elections and the dissolution of the National Assembly decided by President Emmanuel Macron, the main left-wing parties met on Friday to celebrate their union. They promised social measures, an increase in the minimum wage, abandonment of the increase in the retirement age, reestablishment of the wealth tax, etc., in the event of success in the legislative elections scheduled for June 30 and July 7.
The result of difficult negotiations, the common program of this “New Popular Front” also outlines a compromise on questions of international politics which have deeply divided the left in recent months.
On the Middle East, he thus calls “to act for the release of hostages held since the terrorist massacres of Hamas, whose theocratic project we reject, and for the release of Palestinian political prisoners.” The main force on the left, the La France Insoumise party (LFI, radical left) has so far refused to assimilate Palestinian Hamas to a terrorist movement, breaking with the position of France and the European Union.
This divergence between LFI and its partners also caused the collapse last fall of the previous union of left-wing parties, NUPES, an acronym for the New Ecological and Social Popular Union, created with a view to the 2022 legislative elections.
On the war in Ukraine, another point of tension on the left, the coalition is committed to “unwaveringly defending the sovereignty and freedom of the Ukrainian people” and to ensuring “necessary” arms deliveries to Kyiv.
However, the debate remains open on the identity of who, on the left, could become prime minister. “We need a person who creates consensus,” declared the Social Democratic MEP Raphaël Glucksmann, who came first in the European elections on the left, disqualifying Jean-Luc Mélenchon, tribune of the radical left and divisive personality, accused of proximity to the Russia and ambiguous positions on anti-Semitism.
Other persistent areas of disagreement, however, were left aside, such as NATO.
United, the left begins to hope for a “victory” but faces a National Rally (RN, far right) which is on the rise, buoyed by its unprecedented score in the European elections (31.3%).
Given the big favorite in the election, the party is seeking to broaden its support in order to gain power for the first time in its history. Its leader, Marine Le Pen, promised Friday that the RN would form “a government of national unity” to “get France out of the rut” in the event of victory in the second round of the election on July 7.
“We will bring together all French people, men and women of good will, who are aware of the catastrophic situation in our country,” declared the far-right leader.
Since Sunday, the RN, heir to the National Front, a party co-founded in 1972 by a Waffen-SS, Pierre Bousquet, has garnered several rallies including that of Eric Ciotti, president of the main conservative party, Les Républicains (LR).
The unprecedented alliance he proposed with the far right shattered his party, from which several former presidents of the French Republic come.
Mr. Ciotti was excluded by his party’s authorities but clings to his post and has filed an appeal against his ouster which must be examined on Friday by the Paris judicial court, whose decision is expected around 1 p.m. ballast).
His opponents must bring together a new political office to validate this exclusion.
Faced with this accelerated political recomposition, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal denounced “boutique deals” on the right and the left and tried to boost the morale of the government camp, promised to suffer a heavy defeat according to the polls.
From Bari, Italy, where he is participating in the G7 Summit, Emmanuel Macron estimated on Thursday that he was “not weakened” on the international scene, despite the very real possibility that he would be forced to appoint a prime minister from the oppositions after the legislative.
The head of state, whose popularity rating is at its lowest since his re-election in 2022, also hoped that the approach of the Paris Olympic Games from July 26 to August 11 could work in his favor. “I think that [the French] do not want to have an Olympic Games that are looking bad,” he assured, implicitly targeting the leaders of the RN who would be “not ready at all” to ensure the organization of the event.
