France has been plunged into turmoil. This time not by the actions of protesters, rioters or striking workers, but by the president of the French Republic himself.
In the aftermath of the European elections last month, Emmanuel Macron was facing the success of Marine Le Pen’s right-populist National Rally (RN) and the plummeting popularity of his own Ensemble coalition. As a result, he immediately dissolved the National Assembly and called snap legislative elections – despite the constitution in no way compelling him to do so. For the past two years, his party and his government have been struggling along without an absolute majority. The result at the weekend, after two rounds of voting, is a well and truly hung parliament.
A hung parliament was predicted by the pollsters. What they did not foresee was that the largest block of MPs would be not from the RN, but from the far-left-dominated New Popular Front (NFP) coalition. With the latter winning 188 seats, Macron’s centrist coalition 161 and the RN and its allies 142, no one is close to the 289 needed for an absolute majority. Worse still, it is not at all clear what kind of ‘coalition of coalitions’ could even form a majority. In the meantime, as the largest group, the NFP is insisting that a new prime minister should be appointed from its ranks to form a government so that it can put into practice its radical programme.
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