“Tonight, social justice won. Tonight, environmental justice won. Tonight, the people won. And it’s only just started,” said France’s Green leader Marine Tondelier, as thousands took to the streets of Paris to celebrate a surprise left-wing surge that blocked the far-right National Rally (RN) and its allies from their anticipated success in the French elections.
In contrast, there was stunned silence at the far-right National Rally (RN) party headquarters as the results of France’s legislative elections came in.
The leftist alliance unexpectedly took the top spot in the elections, ahead of the far-right in a major upset that bars Marine Le Pen's National Rally from getting enough seats to form a government.
The New Popular Front alliance - which includes the former ruling Socialist party (PS), France Unbowed, Greens and Communists - secured 182 seats in the 577-seat parliament. President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist alliance also performed better than expected with 163 seats, while the RN and their allies came short of their poll leads, with only 143 seats, to come in third.
Leftist party leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon has called on Macron to step down or choose a new prime minister from the winning leftwing alliance.
Macron’s protege Gabriel Attal announced that he would offer his resignation as prime minister this morning.
No party has an outright majority, meaning that there will be a hung parliament in a country that is not used to coalition building.
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