For the first time in history, the right-wing opposition party in France has elected a female candidate for next year’s presidential election.
Valérie Pécresse won two rounds of voting among members of Les Républicains. Unexpectedly, in the first vote last week, popular candidates including “Mr. Brexit” Michel Barnier were eliminated.
With more than four months to go before the April 10 elections, Pecres is now facing an uphill struggle to impose himself on the presidential campaign. Her rivals include the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, the Socialist candidate lagging behind in the polls, and Pecres often clashed with her decisions in the city hall.
The results of a poll of 150,000 party members were announced on Saturday afternoon. Supporters chanted “Valerie, Valerie” and the results showed that she defeated her far-right rival Eric by 61% to 39%. · Éric Ciotti. Neither of them was a favorite that passed the first round.
The 54-year-old Pécresse is currently the chairman of the Île-de-France Regional Council, which includes Paris. During Nicolas Sarkozy’s 2007-12 presidency, she served as Minister of Budget and Minister of Higher Education.
“This is the first time in our party’s history that a female candidate has participated in the presidential election,” she said. “Between the outgoing president and me, our personalities are different. Emmanuel Macron has an obsession, which is to please. I, I have only one hobby, and that is doing.”
She added: “Nothing is doomed. We are not condemned as chaos or decline. Our country is full of talent and energetic.
“The Republican right is back… We will restore our country’s unity, dignity, and pride.”
During the party’s primary elections, the main candidates of the Republican Party shifted from the traditional center-right field of the party to the extreme right. Jyoti announced that a referendum will be held to prevent large-scale immigration and the establishment of “Guantanamo Bay, France” to deal with terrorism.
Pecres called herself “two-thirds of Angela Merkel and one-third of Margaret Thatcher”, and she considered her to be a candidate for Macron with experience and prestige. As Minister of Education, she faced long-standing street protests and university sit-ins to force higher education reforms. As a former budget minister, she has always been pro-European and moderate. If she can enter the Elysee Palace, she promised to focus on the economy and consensus building, and promised to increase wages and end the 35-hour maximum work week.
However, in the campaign that has turned endlessly so far Around the three selves-immigration, integration, Islam- Pécresse also toughened her line, promising to pass laws to strengthen “domestic security and combat Islamic extremism.”
Whether she will move further to the right remains to be seen, but in Saturday’s victory speech, Pecreese called on voters to “be tempted by Marina Le Pen or Eric Zemur”-leading the campaign so far The two far-right contenders.
“There is no need to be an extremist in order to be combative, and there is no need to be insulted in order to be convincing,” she said. “You know, fearful businessmen have never been able to act. In our history, no one can divide us and save us.”
Pécresse was born in Neuilly-sur-Seine, a wealthy Paris suburb, and graduated from the now-defunct National School of Administration (ENA), which is big school And the greenhouse of the country’s political elites won an impressive second place in her class.Even before that, she had been a talented student, surpassing her Bachelor’s degree 16 years old, two years in advance, 15 years old to learn Russian, and spent the same time in the young communist camp of the former Soviet Union.
“I took a publicity course and sang International In Russian,” she recalled afterwards. “From these trips, I developed an attachment to freedom of thought, that is, non-conventionalism is more right-wing than left-wing. And language. “
France’s 2022 presidential election will be two rounds of voting. The first will be held on April 10 and the second will be held two weeks later. The final list of candidates will not be announced until March, when all candidates must submit a list of 500 people signed by the country’s mayor or selected officials. So far, about 20 people have officially announced their candidacy, of which 8 are from the left.
Opinion polls conducted before Pécresse was selected as the candidate for Les Républicains showed that Macron is still expected to be re-elected next year, but the most likely scenario is still the second round of double elections between the president and Le Pen, which is 2017 A repeat of the year.
Before Pécresse’s victory, Xavier Bertrand, a former minister and current president of the Hauts-de-France region including Calais, was considered the right wing’s best chance to overthrow Macron, but even so, most opinion polls still rank him. In fourth place. In the first round, behind Le Pen and Zemo.
At the same time, the left is divided and struggling.According to BFM TV ElyseemiAs a merger of the main polls, Hidalgo lags behind the candidate of the Eco-Green Party Yannick Giardo and the far-left Jean-Luc Melanchon.
Zemore His first election rally will be held on Sunday night, and 19,000 people are expected to attend. On Friday, he announced his slogan: “It can’t be French” (It can’t be a French word). About 50 trade unions, political organizations and anti-fascist associations called for demonstrations in Paris to cooperate with the rally, and the police feared that there would be a conflict.
