France elections: How the second round of voting is shaping up

By Rabia Ali

ISTANBUL (AA) – As France gears up for the second round of its crucial parliamentary polls on Sunday, significant shifts and strategic alliances are in the offing, with analysts warning of “uncertain times” ahead.

The National Rally (RN), led by Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella, is aiming to form France’s first far-right government since World War II, having swept more than 33% of the vote and 39 seats in the first round along with its allies.

The RN alone had a staggering figure of more than 9.37 million votes.

To block its path, the centrist Together for the Republic alliance backed by President Emmanuel Macron and the left-wing New Popular Front are collaborating in the second round, but the jury is still out on whether they can succeed.

The New Popular Front had over 8.9 million votes in the June 30 first round, almost 28%, coming in second with 32 seats, while Together for the Republic finished third with slightly over 20% and just two seats.

The French National Assembly, the lower house of parliament, has 577 seats and a party needs to win at least 289 to form a government with an absolute majority.

With a total of 76 lawmakers elected in the first round, there are now 501 seats to be filled in the runoffs.

Like many others, political analyst Alexander Seale believes the first round showed that Macron’s “very big gamble” of dissolving parliament and announcing snap elections after the RN’s European Parliament election win has backfired.

“France is facing uncertain times,” he warned.

- Can the far-right advance be blocked?

In French politics, there is a specific term for what the parties of the center and left are trying to do for the second round: “front republicain” or “republican front.”

The most recent use of this strategy was when Le Pen had a chance to beat Macron in the 2022 presidential election, said Seale.

“At the time, the centrists, left-wing politicians and right-wing politicians all gathered together to try to beat the far right,” he said.

Ahead of the July 7 vote, more than 200 candidates who finished third in the first round have withdrawn.

This includes 131 candidates from the New Popular Front and 82 from Together for the Republic, according to French daily Le Monde.

With the exclusion of the weakest candidate, voters have a direct choice between the far-right contender and the strongest challenger, increasing the latter’s chances.

Seale pointed out that the strategy worked particularly well in 2002, when Le Pen’s father Jean-Marie Le Pen was up against Jacques Chirac in the presidential runoff.

Chirac, a conservative, won with 82% of the vote, he said.

Right now, Seale feels the republican front is “really drifting away,” with more people likely to vote for the far right.

“There are all sorts of reasons. People are jobless, people don’t have opportunities, so they think that if they vote for the far right, something could change,” he said.

Recent polls, however, suggest the strategy could work on Sunday and prevent the RN from security a majority.

A poll by research firm Harris Interactive for French media outlets showed the RN and its allies could end up with 190 to 220 seats, well short of a majority.

Seale said Le Pen remains very confident of winning a majority, but there are lots of questions and the final say rests with the public.

- What are the other scenarios?

If the RN does win, France will enter a period of “cohabitation,” another way of saying power-sharing, with a president and prime minister from different parties, something that happened several times in the 1980s and 1990s.

In such a system, the president’s executive power decreases as they have to give more space to the prime minister, which in this case would be RN leader Bardella.

Given the RN’s current standing, questions have been raised about Macron’s future plans, but the president has said he intends to stay on until the next presidential election in 2027.

The other outcome is a hung parliament where no party has a majority.

If that happens, Macron will “struggle to find ways to find a majority for laws that he will pass,” said Seale.

A hung parliament comes with its set of unknowns and challenges, he said.

“If they don’t have a majority, then Macron will have to think about who to name as prime minister,” he added.

“It may be someone from a huge coalition, but will a coalition work? I don’t think so, because all these political leaders are egocentric.”

- Fears about the far right

According to Seale, Macron’s snap election decision has become a huge risk for France’s security and stability.

“If a far-right government comes to power, Macron’s relationship with Ukraine, for example, is going to be very fragile. The far right will control the forces, the army, everything to do with the Foreign Ministry, so it’s really, really frightening,” he said.

He said the elections have also cast a shadow over the upcoming Paris Olympics, set to begin in the French capital on July 26.

“Will France be stable? Will they have a stable government? That’s the big question,” he said.

Given the uncertainty over France’s political future, Seale believes the voter turnout – estimated to be over 65% in the first round – will remain high on Sunday.

“People will go out en masse in these kinds of circumstances in order to, perhaps, push the far-right out of power and to maybe vote for a huge coalition,” he said.