The president of France, Emmanuel Macronurged rival parties on Wednesday to unite in a democratic alliance against the far-right National Regrouping (RN) of Marine Le Penwhile the conservative formation of Los Republicanos (LR) dismissed its leader for seeking an extreme right pact.
The rapid political developments follow Macron’s surprising decision to call a early parliamentary elections in a few weeks. The vote could give real power to Le Pen’s party after years on the sidelines.
“We are ready to assume power if the French give us their trust,” Le Pen assured her enraged followers on Sunday after her party achieved just over 30% of the votes.
In what amounts to a campaign speech, Macron on Wednesday defended his decision to call early voting and urged parties on both sides of the political center to join him in the battle against the hard right in the June 30 election. and July 7.
Macron, who ruled out resigning if his ruling alliance loses, called on “compatriots and political leaders who do not recognize themselves in the extremist fever” to “build a new project… a coalition to govern.”
In a sign of the political chaos generated by Macron’s decision, the LR leadership decided on Wednesday to fire its boss, Eric Ciotti, after he appealed for an electoral alliance with RN.
Macron described such an agreement as a “pact with the devil” that would have put an end to decades of political consensus to prevent the extreme right from gaining power.
Ciotti said on social network X that the LR meeting did not follow protocol: “I am and will continue to be the president of our political party, elected by the members“, he claimed.
Macron called the elections on Sunday, after the anti-immigration and eurosceptic RN party won the vote for the European Parliament. RN is expected to obtain 31% of the votes in the first round on June 30, while a leftist alliance would obtain 28%, according to an Elabe poll. Macron’s candidacy would obtain 18%.
On the other hand, the leader of the far-right Italian League, Matteo Salviniand the Frenchwoman Marie Le Pen met this Tuesday in Brussels and agreed on the objective of trying to unite all the forces of the “center-right,” sources from the Italian party reported.
“Centre-right unity, no opening to leftists and eco-fanatics, determination to change this Europe”, this is what Matteo Salvini and Marine Le Pen shared during their conversation in Brussels, in a preview of the meeting with all the leaders that make up the group Identity and Democracy (ID), the sources added.
According to Salvini – they added – “European citizens have expressed themselves very clearly. Only Macron and Von der Leyen did not notice.”
Later, both met with other leaders of the Identity and Democracy (ID) group: Geert Wilders, Tomio Okamura, Harald Vilimsky, Gerolf Annemans, Tom Van Grieken, Morten Messerschmidt and André Ventura.
(With information from Reuters and EFE)
