Macron out in front but still all to play for in France’s presidential elections

Europe exhaled tonight. The Earth did not move. Emmanuel Macron remains on course to win a second term as President of France. But in Round one of the presidential elections, he was run close by Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-right National Rally, who could still come from behind in Round Two of the contest, in two weeks’ time, to register the biggest electoral upset in the history of the Fifth Republic. 

According to the semi-official exit poll conducted by the market research group Ipsos, Macron won 28.5 per cent of the vote against 23.6 per cent for Le Pen. 

The turnout was just under 74 per cent – somewhat lower than in 2017. Valérie Pécresse, the candidate for the centre-right Republicans, ended up with a mere 4.8 per cent of the vote – the worst-ever performance by a Gaullist contender – but still did better than Anne Hidalgo, the mayor of Paris, on behalf of the once-mighty Socialists, who could only manage a derisory 1.8 per cent. 

Éric Zemmour, the racist firebrand who sat on Le Pen’s shoulder in the early weeks of the campaign, faded badly, achieving just 7.0 per cent of the total vote. His support will now switch to Le Pen, who, ironically, can also hope for transfers in Round Two from a third or more of those from France Unbowed, now the leading party of the Left, whose semi-house-trained candidate, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, scored a creditable and hard-won 20.3 per cent. 

Macron will be gratified not only that he achieved more than 28 per cent – at the high end of expectations in recent days – but that Pécresse and Hidalgo, as well as the Communist and Green Party leaders, called on their supporters to vote for him on April 24. Mélenchon could not bring himself to endorse Macron, whom he despises, but he did say that “not a single one” of his supporters should switch sides to Le Pen. 

The second round of the presidentials is markedly different in character from the opener. It is traditionally when people vote with their heads rather than their hearts. The likelihood is that more erstwhile opponents will support Macron in the second round than will turn to Le Pen, which should give the incumbent President the edge. Tthe silent, or absent, majority for the status quo is expected to opt for more of the same with Macron than the uncertainty and possible international delinquency assocated with the National Rally. 

All that said, it is far from guaranteed that Macron will continue as locataire of the Élysée after his first, five-year term expires on May 13. Le Pen was jubliant after the polls closed and is in no doubt that she remains a viable alternative to a “president of the rich” widely disliked for his lack of a common touch. 

For now, Europe will be relieved that Macron has kept his nose in front in the ongoing contest, as will the US and NATO. Le Pen and the third-placed Mélenchon have always opposed the Atlantic Alliance and are also instinctively out of sympathy with the European Project. A France headed by Marine Le Pen could look only to the government of Hungary for common cause within the EU, though it is certain that Vladimir Putin would also send his congratulations. 

For the Republicans and the Socialists, the results were an unmitigated disaster. The two great parties of the Fifth Republic are now just shadows of what they were even five years ago. Macron and his En Marche movement have captured the centre, at least in the race for the Élysée, while Mélenchon and the Greens, as well as various splinter groups of the far-left, have abandoned the Socialist Party so that it is not so much bruised as broken. 

And so the campaign moves on to the next phase, during which Macron and Le Pen will debate their policies freed from all restraints. There will be much talk of who can best manage the post-pandemic economy on behalf of the greatest number and which of them can best resolve the many issues posed by France’s  burgeoning Muslim population. 

Whichever of them come out on top on April 24 will then have to enter the lists again, this time in the elections to the National Assembly, due to take place on June 12 and 19. France’s parliament is a ponderous body, deeply factional and incoherent. But no government can be formed that does not enjoy the support of a majority of its 577 deputies, to whom the prime minister and his cabinet colleagues, appointed by the President, must answer. 

The election season that opened yesterday has another two months to run, and anything could happen. But for now, Emmanuel Macron can draw a breath and hope with growing conviction that he will be the first President since Jacques Chirac in 2007 to serve a second term.