Alliance of left-wing parties gets majority of seats in French parliament

By Seyma Uzundere

The leftist New Popular Front alliance, which won France's second round of early general elections, secured 178 seats in parliament, the Interior Ministry announced on Monday, indicating that no political party or alliance will be able to form the next government on its own.

According to the election results announced by the ministry, the New Popular Front alliance of four leftist parties won the majority in the National Assembly in the second round of snap elections on July 7, winning 178 seats.

President Emmanuel Macron's alliance Renaissance party won 150 seats in parliament, while the far-right National Rally (RN) got 125.

Voter turnout was 66.6%, according to the official announcement.

With these results, no alliance or party could secure an absolute majority of 289 deputies in the parliament.

The number of Macron alliance’s seats, which currently has 250 deputies, has decreased to 150.

The number of RN deputies has increased from 89 to 125.

The leftist alliance up from 150 to 178 seats.

- Far-right

Following the RN's victory with approximately 33% of the vote in the first round of the French general elections on June 30, Macron and the leftist parties engaged in tacit cooperation.

After the first round, more than 200 candidates from other parties withdrew from the election race in 306 electoral districts, where three candidates advanced to the second round, to avoid splitting votes and giving the far right an advantage.

Official data show that 215 candidates who qualified for the second round chose not to run to prevent the RN from winning.

- Early elections

The RN, which has increased its vote share in the last three French elections, more than doubled its closest rival, Macron's Renaissance party, with 31.4% of the vote in the European Parliament election on June 9.

Following the far-right's victory in the European Parliament elections, Macron dissolved the National Assembly on the night of June 9 and announced snap polls.

He justified his decision by citing the need for a democratic response to the European Parliament election results.

However, the fact that the country would hold early elections just before the 2024 Paris Olympics, which will take place from July 26 to Aug. 11, sparked public concern that it would lead to political instability and social unrest.

Leftist parties, which failed to form an alliance in the last general elections, banded together under the New Popular Front in a short time to fight the far right in the polls and announced that they would field a single candidate.

The New Popular Front includes the country's leading leftist parties, the Socialist Party (PS), Unbowed France (LFI), Communist Party of France (PCF), and environmentalist party Greens (EELV).

The RN allied with Eric Ciotti, leader of the center-right Republicans (LR) party, and some of its members, while the ruling Renaissance party and its partners, the MoDem and Horizons Party had formed the "All Together for the Republic Alliance.”

In the first round of the election, the far-right alliance came first with around 33% of the vote, the New Popular Front alliance came second with 28%, and Macron's alliance finished third with 20%.

While 76 deputies were elected in the first round of the election, 39 of them were candidates from the far right, 32 from the left alliance, two from the Macron alliance, and the remaining three from the center-right Republicans and other right-wing parties.

*Writing by Merve Berker