French President Emmanuel Macron left his country reeling on Sunday after he dissolved parliament and called snap general elections in response to hefty gains by the far-right Rassemblement national (RN) party in European elections.
Around 373 million citizens from 27 countries belonging to the European Union bloc were eligible to vote in polls running from June 6 to 9, to decide who will represent them in the 720-seat European parliament.
According to preliminary forecasts for France, RN has taken 31.5% of the votes cast there, which will give it roughly 30 of France’s 81 seats. Macron’s Renaissance coalition looks set to come in second with 15.2%, followed by the Socialists with the 14%.
“This is not a good result for the parties which defend Europe, including that of the presidential majority,” Macron said in a televized address.
He noted far right parties RN and Reconquête had taken 40% of the vote.
“The rise of nationalists and demagogues is a danger to our nation,” he said. “I cannot act as if nothing has happened… I have decided to give you back the parliamentary choice… and I am therefore dissolving the Assembly national.”
Macron has set the parliamentary elections for June 30 and July 7, with the second round taking place less than a month before France hosts the Olympic Games in Paris.
There were moves to the right in a number of countries across the EU bloc.
In Germany, which holds 96 seats, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party looked set to come in second with 16% of the vote, a 5% gain on 2019 polls.
The conservative alliance of the Christian Democratic Union and the Christian Social Union held on to its poll position with a projected 30.2% of the vote.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democratic Party (SPD) was forecast to come in third with 13.9%, while the Greens were predicted to take 11.9%, an 8.6 percentage point fall on 2019.