For the first time since 1986, more or less 67% of the voters have decided to cast their vote, which is a big and a happy surprise.

Axar.az reports that, French expert Emmanuel Dupuy, President of the Institute for Prospective and Security in Europe (IPSE), discussing the downfall of Macronism.

- The first round of the parliamentary elections in France is over. What are your observations about it?

“Since there will be a second round next week. But what we can observe is a mass mobilization of voters. For the first time since 1986, more or less 67% of the voters have decided to cast their vote, which is a big and a happy surprise, as we have had the impression that the voting process is not something that the French assess as a absolute necessity. That's my first observation.

The second observation is that the presidential parties, the so-called census bloc, which is not the presidential party, but because there are a lot of parties inside this coalition, do not vote for Emmanuel Macron, but vote against the National Rally on Westfalt and the new Populist Front on Geneva. That means that the Macronism and the political parties seem to have collapsed during this first round of elections and very likely will collapse during the second round of elections.”

The French political expert indicated the end of Macronism, as the votes shows the downfall of the movement.

“When the potential Macronist candidates can only stay in 300 out of 577 second sections. Second observation is that we have elsewhere in Europe a polarization of our political life, where the extreme right is strong and the extreme left is building momentum and getting stronger. Therefore, a sort of justification or a sort of confirmation of what is happening in France is happening elsewhere in Europe, where most likely a majority of the political leaders are now extra conservative or have radical extreme right forces close to come to power, which is the case in Spain, which is the case in Portugal, which is the case in Sweden, and of course in Hungary, in Slovakia, maybe in the next elections in Austria, in Antwerp.

According to the decision of the president, he had no choice but to dissolve the National Assembly,
because he doesn't have a clear majority and hasn't had a clear majority since 2022. Either his government would have collapsed in a few weeks, when the Republicans would have voted a censorship of his government, therefore obliging him to change again, Prime Minister, and to put aside that he cannot make his laws rooted at the Parliament. Now, the overall question is, what is the result of this?

The result of this is an awakening of Macron's presidency. It is a very clear signal given by the voters that they do not want Macron to run again, or is camped to run again in 2027. The successor of Macron will follow the same path as the actual president, and of course the overall message of that is that in a cohabitation, the president will no longer have the initiative, or only authoritarily have the initiative. He will have to cohabit with a Prime Minister, whether it's a leftist Prime Minister or a rightist Prime Minister.

- What do you think are the main reasons for the defeat of the ruling party?

Well, Emmanuel Macron has not taken into consideration that his policies were not popular. He has not taken into consideration a certain number of grievances made by the French voters and the French citizens when it comes to the pension reform, when it comes to the agricultural prices, when it comes to the raise of the prices of materials and essential goods. He hasn't listened to what the civil society was asking him for. He hasn't associated the opposition to the democratic process. He hasn't sufficiently taken into consideration that even though he was re-elected in 2042, his legislative majority was very fragile. And again, it collapsed after two years instead of collapsing in the immediate months after his election.