Hollande’s Socialist Party suffers setback in French local elections

PanARMENIAN.Net - French President François Hollande’s Socialist Party suffered an electoral setback Sunday, March 22, as the center-right alliance of former President Nicolas Sarkozy came out on top in the first round of local elections and the far-right National Front took about a quarter of the vote, the Wall Street Journal reports.

The Socialist Party’s share of the vote dropped to 21.3% from 24.9% in a comparable election in 2011, according to estimates from polling companies Ifop and Fiducial. Sarkozy’s UMP party and its centrist allies took 30% of the vote and the anti-immigration, anti-European National Front took 26% of the first-round vote, a jump of more than 10 points from 2011.

The first round of elections for representatives at France’s 101 local jurisdictions known as départements showed a political landscape strongly shifting toward the right just over halfway through Hollande’s five-year term.

Sarkozy, whose UMP did better than many opinion polls had predicted, said the result showed voters are exasperated with the Socialist government. “Masses of our citizens have turned away from the left because they think they have been lied to for the last three years,” he said in a televised statement.

Hollande’s popularity has collapsed as he struggled to deliver on his 2012 campaign pledges to restore economic growth and reduce unemployment while persistent budget deficits have pushed public debt to more than 95% of annual economic output.

The National Front’s strength in the first round of voting underlines party leader Marine Le Pen’s success in feeding off those poor economic results. She has bolstered the National Front’s support by restraining its controversial far-right elements and focusing party vitriol against the European Union and mainstream parties, which many voters blame for France’s problems. The party came out on top in European elections last May after taking control of 11 towns in municipal elections in March.

“The National Front is taking root election after election,” Le Pen said.

To be elected in the first round, candidates must get more than 50% of the votes cast and a share of the vote that represents more than 25% of registered voters. Sunday’s turnout was around 50% of registered voters.

If nobody wins outright in the first round, the two leading candidates progress to a second round, in addition to any other candidate with votes from more than 12.5% of registered voters.

Socialist Prime Minister Manuel Valls, according to the Journal, called on voters to block the National Front by casting their ballot for what he called Republican parties in the second round, even if that means voting for the center right.

“I call on everyone to have a clear position and to vote for the Republican candidate from the left or the right when they are alone against the far right,” Valls said.

His plea for the mainstream parties to unite fell on deaf ears at the UMP. If a Socialist candidate faces a National Front candidate in a runoff, the UMP won’t call on its supporters to vote for either, Sarkozy said.