Middle-east Arab News Opinion | Asharq Al-awsat

What if Marine Le Pen Wins French Elections? | ASHARQ AL-AWSAT English Archive 2005 -2017
Select Page
Media ID: 55371242
Caption:

Marine Le Pen will be hoping to continue to defy the odds in a
second round runoff in May. – Reuters


Paris – What if far-right candidate Marine Le Pen wins the French presidential elections? A question asked by voters who oppose the far-right wing two weeks before the anticipated event, amid surveys suggesting that Marine Le Pen will make it to the second round.

It is likely for the candidate opposing the EU membership and migration to be defeated, but all possibilities are open for Le Pen in the second round on May 7, according to a report by AFP.

Following both unexpected events, “Brexit” and the election of US president Donald Trump, Le Pen seeks to restructure “France’s affairs” – by the time two-third of the French voters didn’t make their final decision.

Over the past months, articles, columns, and activities in media and newspapers have tackled the repercussions of electing the leader of France’s National Front (FN), which has remarkably diffused its thoughts in the few past years.

Le Pen’s victory represents an obvious threat, according to Matthieu Croissandeau, editor-in-chief of the “L’Obs” weekly magazine.

This week, almost a hundred artist including actresses Jeanne Moreau and Léa Seydoux, stated that the National Front is about to rule, and called on people to stand up to Marine Le Pen in the name of freedom, intellect, and art.

Others asserted that they will choose asylum, like anti-Trump Americans who consider leaving to Canada.

The French-Mauritian writer Jean Marie Gustave Le Clezio, awarded Nobel Prize in Literature, announced in 2015 that he will give up his French citizenship if Le Pen becomes a president.

France’s ambassador to Japan Thierry Dana has said publicly that he would refuse to serve as a diplomat if Marine Le Pen was elected president, because he refuses to serve a National Front-run state.

FIDH President Dimitris Christopoulos, who defends immigrants’ rights, said that Le Pen’s presidency will be a political defeat of human rights, speaking with AFP, he said that this “ideological battle” will become an existential priority for communities.

Editor in Chief of Liberation Laurent Joffrin said that in case Le Pen was elected, alarm bells will be heard, since Trump’s election, the US newspapers launched a resistance movement against the new president, and France’s media will do the same.

Joffrin added that fascism will not rule over night – laws’ endorsement requires a majority in the national assembly, thus, the main battle will be waged after elections to prevent the National Front from acquiring this majority to implement its program and reach a “cohabitation status”.