Cheers erupted on the streets of Paris late Sunday after results predicted the left-wing New Popular Front (NFP) would defeat the far-right National Rally (RN) party in France’s snap parliamentary election.
A large crowd later gathered in the capital’s Place de la République to celebrate the left-wing coalition winning more seats in parliament, chanting the popular left-wing slogan “Youth screw the National Front”.
The NFP is an amalgamation of several parties, ranging from the far-left France Unbot party to the more moderate socialists and ecologists.
The coalition won 182 seats in the National Assembly, making it the largest group, but fell short of the 289 seats needed for an absolute majority, the French Interior Ministry said.
Speaking to a crowd of ecstatic supporters near Stalingrad Square, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the firebrand leader of France’s Anbo, said the results were “a great relief for the majority of people in our country”.
“Our people have clearly rejected the worst-case scenario,” Mélenchon said. “A spectacular surge of civil mobilization has taken hold!”
On Sunday night, police cleared the Place de la République and fired tear gas into crowds of people, mostly young people.
But the demonstrators were upbeat, and photos showed people across the city cheering and celebrating.
The mood was much worse for supporters of the far-right RN party.
The subdued atmosphere at the RN campaign event in Paris’ Bois de Vincennes park took a nosedive an hour before polls closed as it became clear the far-right coalition would come third in the polls.
After the prediction is announced, Jordan BartellaThe RN’s 28-year-old leader said France had been plunged into “uncertainty and instability”.
Despite leading after the first round of voting, Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally (RN) party and its allies won 143 seats.
With no party getting a majority, Parliament is likely to be deadlocked and split into three constituencies.
The RN’s strong showing in the first round fueled fears that France could be on the verge of electing its first far-right government since the World War II collaborationist Vichy regime.
But Sunday’s results were a major upset, and show the overwhelming desire of French voters to prevent the far-right from taking power – even at the cost of a hung parliament.
President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist bloc, which slipped to an abysmal third place in last Sunday’s first round of voting, staged a strong recovery to win 163 seats.
Macron’s supporter Gabriel Atal announced his resignation as prime minister on Monday morning. He appeared to take a swipe at Macron’s decision to call for a snap referendum, saying he had “not chosen” to dissolve France’s parliament.
After parliamentary elections, the French president appoints a prime minister from the party with the most seats. Ordinarily, it means a candidate from the president’s own party. However, Sunday’s results leave Macron facing the possibility of appointing a man from the left-wing coalition, in a rare arrangement known as “collaboration”.
Speaking to supporters near Stalingrad Square, Mélenchon said “Macron has a duty to call for a new People’s Front to govern.”
