French right-wing National Rally (RN) de facto leader Marine Le Pen has called for new elections in France following her meeting with Prime Minister François Bayrou.
“We are calling for an immediate dissolution [of Parliament],” she declared on September 2, rejecting Bayrou’s budget proposals.
She argued that the only way for France to gain stability was for the French to opt for a “break with Macronism.”
“Let’s not fool ourselves, [French President] Emmanuel Macron’s policies are profoundly toxic,” she added.
Before the meeting, RN President Jordan Bardella stated that the party was “ready for anything”.
RN has set its sights on the September 8 vote of confidence called by Bayrou, warning that he had chosen to sit “on the ejector seat”.
Party officials are openly confident about their chances should a new election be called.
Bardella boasted that 85 per cent of candidates were already lined up, while vice president Sébastien Chenu said on September 2 that “almost all” have been pre-selected.
“I believe we can achieve an absolute majority. I think the collapse of the central bloc [the Republicans and Macron’s Renaissance party] could lead to a majority for the RN and its allies,” Chenu said.
“We are looking at things right now, and the polls suggest that we could be in the lead.”
“We want to be in power, even if it’s only for 18 months [until parliamentary elections that could follow presidential elections]. We want to show the French people what we can do in very difficult times,” he added.
The current National Assembly, France’s lower house of parliament, is in gridlock with no clear majority.
At the last parliamentary election, RN led the polls and won the first round with 29,25 per cent of the vote, followed by the left-wing alliance on 27,99 per cent and Macron’s party on 20,04 per cent.
But it lost the second round to the left-wing alliance, the New Popular Front (NPF), a broad church of centre-left and left-wing parties.
Following the loss, local members of the RN blamed the election results on the party’s national leaders.
Le Pen’s embezzlement conviction in late March bans her for five years from public office. She is still fighting her sentence in court.
“There is clearly a legal route via the Constitutional Council that would allow her to stand as a candidate,” said Chenu; however, he ruled out the possibility of Le Pen becoming the new resident at Matignon (where the Prime Minister resides).
The party has recently been caught up in a series of legal issues.
