Unthinkable just a few weeks ago, as their antagonisms on many subjects are great – whether on Europe, nuclear power or the position vis-à-vis Russia – the left-wing parties have nevertheless managed to an agreement in a few days for the legislative elections of 12 and 19 June. La France insoumise (LFI), the environmentalist pole, including Europe Ecology-Les Verts in particular, the Socialist Party (PS) and the French Communist Party (PCF) will therefore present common candidates in more than 500 constituencies under the label of the New People’s Ecological and Social Union (Nupes). With the ambition of imposing cohabitation on Emmanuel Macron by bringing Jean-Luc Mélenchon to Matignon.
The last piece of this puzzle was brought by the national council of the PS, which validated with 62% of the votes the alliance with La France insoumise after a very tense meeting, on the night of Thursday May 5 to Friday May 6. A family photo of this new alliance was to be taken on Saturday afternoon, in Aubervilliers (Seine-Saint-Denis), with all the leaders of the signatory parties and the invested candidates present. At “20 hours” of France 2, Friday evening, the leader of La France insoumise welcomed: “The good news is that when we started talking, we realized that each other did not conform to the caricature we had of each other. »
On the side of the direction of the PS, we also said to ourselves ” relieved “ a few hours after the vote of the party parliament. On Franceinfo, Friday morning, the spokesman and negotiator, Pierre Jouvet, thus welcomed “a historic gathering”. “The French men and women were waiting for us, desperate for this disunity, and we proved that we were able to come together to converge on a common project, to change people’s lives”, he welcomed, while the agreement with LFI was strongly criticized by socialist figures such as François Hollande, Jean-Marc Ayrault or Stéphane Le Foll. Former Prime Minister Bernard Cazeneuve had, meanwhile, decided to leave the PS after the announcement of the agreement on Wednesday.
“A form of clarification”
For the socialist president of Seine-Saint-Denis, Stéphane Troussel, this alliance with the movement founded by Mr. Mélenchon thus allows “a form of clarification” among the socialists by turning the page on François Hollande’s five-year term. The agreement signed with La France insoumise also plans to revisit the El Khomri law, adopted during the socialist five-year term, which thoroughly reformed the labor code. “Left voters no longer really knew where to place the PS, recalls Mr. Troussel. This vote very clearly means that the PS is in a camp, that of the left.he continued.
Beyond the substance of this agreement, the issue of constituencies may still be on the table in the coming weeks, with the possibility of some dissenting candidates. The socialist president of the Occitanie region, Carole Delga, was particularly concerned about the few constituencies reserved for the PS – 70 out of 577, including around thirty “winnable”. She thus warned that she would support dissident candidates on a case-by-case basis. In the region that she leads, only 6 of the 58 constituencies are ultimately devolved to the Socialist Party.
For his part, Mr. Troussel said he hoped for these legislative elections at least “the renewal of a parliamentary group of around 30, 35 deputies”and even, why not, “hope for more if a dynamic is triggered” after this left chord. In these agreements, EELV obtained a hundred constituencies, including thirty deemed “winnable”. While the PCF has obtained sixty, including sixteen where it can hope to win.
A few hours after the validation of the agreement between the PS and LFI, the presidential majority also tried to attract the disappointed socialists. In a statement posted on his Twitter accountOlivier Véran, Minister of Health and former PS deputy, called on his “former comrades” to join the majority for the upcoming legislative elections. “It is not you who are leaving the Socialist Party, it is he who has just left you”, he launched. According to the former elected official, who left the PS in 2016 to join Emmanuel Macron, “the aspiration for parliamentary positions will have been stronger than inspiration and ideas”.
The Delegate General of La République en Marche (LRM), Stanislas Guerini, also appealed to the Social Democrats opposed to this alliance. “When I see that the Socialist Party has simply abandoned the ambition of being a party of government, has renounced its convictions for a few constituencies, then I say ‘join us'”he said on Friday on RTL.