Thousands of people in France on Sunday joined feminist protests against the far-right. The far-right is expected to come out on top in a snap election on June 30, as political parties try to shore up support just days before the polls.
The right-wing National Rally (RN) received about 35 percent of the vote, and “we have to remind people that they are the ones who talk about ‘easy abortion,’ who always attack family planning services,” said Morgane Legras, a nuclear engineer and feminist activist who took part in a march of thousands in Paris.
Protesters dressed in purple marched from the Place de la République square in central Paris to the Place de la Nation in the east, holding placards with messages such as “Push back not our rights, but the far right.”
Rallies were also held in around 50 other cities, such as Toulouse.
France’s two-stage electoral system makes it difficult to predict which party will ultimately win a majority in the lower house of parliament, giving it the post of prime minister, second only to President Emmanuel Macron.
Since Macron dissolved parliament following a landslide defeat in European Parliament elections, his centrists have lagged behind the RN as well as a left-wing coalition called the New Popular Front (NFP) in voting intention polls.
The RN has attracted unprecedented levels of support following a decades-long “anti-demonisation” campaign to distance its image from its roots, which included a co-founder who was a member of the Nazi Waffen-SS paramilitary.
But the core of its message is hostile to immigration, Islam and the European Union.
Senior RN MP Sebastian Chenu on Sunday vowed not to ban the slaughter of animals for the production of halal or kosher meat, pointing to Muslim and Jewish voters.
“If anyone wants, they can eat kosher meat,” Chenu told Jewish broadcaster Radio J.
He said the historic right-wing policy of banning the kippah in public places – which follows in the footsteps of an existing law banning the full-body-covering burqa worn by some Muslim women – was not top of the RN’s agenda, saying its priority was fighting the “Islamic threat”.
‘do better’
In Macron’s camp, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal acknowledged that the European Parliament result – where he got just 14 percent – was “a message to us that we have to do better with our methods and governance in the country.”
He vowed “changes” if his party comes out on top in legislative elections, including “seeking an alliance with the French public and civil society” in an interview with broadcaster RTL.
Macron’s former prime minister, Edouard Philippe, told broadcaster France 3 that Macron’s coalition was “open to anyone who wants to join, whether they are from the conservative right or the social-democratic left.”
Attal also attacked the centrist mantra about threats from left-wing and right-wing “extremists,” saying both promised “massive tax cuts…devastating to the middle class.”
Attal said the RN in particular was “not prepared to govern… it is a party of opposition, not a party of government”.
In a sign of the uneasiness abroad over Macron’s quick election bid, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz told public broadcaster ARD on Sunday that he was “worried about the elections in France”, although “it is up to the French people to decide”.
‘shut up’
Tensions also emerged within the left-wing NFP coalition on Sunday, as the parties hastily reset ties strained by differing reactions to Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7 and the ongoing retaliatory strike by the Israeli military in Gaza.
The differences are particularly pronounced over whether their candidate for prime minister should be Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who heads France Unbowed (LFI) – the group’s largest party, some of whose members have been accused of anti-Semitism.
Former Socialist president François Hollande said on Sunday that Mélenchon “should keep quiet” because “people reject him more strongly than RN leaders Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella”.
“Do we want the left to win, or do we want to escalate the conflict?” he asked.
Mélenchon said on Saturday that his goal was to “govern the country.”
“I will never give up the honour of being the target of attacks,” Mélenchon said at a rally in the southern city of Montpellier on Sunday.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
