French voters opt for Right

Press, 12 March 1985, Page 10

French voters opt for Right

NZPA-AP Paris The French electorate swung to the Right on Sunday in local elections, issuing a warning to the Socialist President, Mr Francois Mitterand, and giving new credibility to the extreme Right National Front party. In the first round of elections widely viewed as a tune-up for next year’s voting for a new National Assembly, the combined total of Rightist parties was 58.4 per cent. The Left, which came to power nationally in May and June 1981 had 41.1 per cent. The voters were choosing representatives for general councils in France’s 95 metropolitan and four overseas departments, or counties. Half of the seats on the general councils are filled every three years for

six-year terms. Leaders of the neo-Gaul-list Rally for the Republic and the Centrist Union for French Democracy said that French voters had rejected Socialism and that the Opposition would oust the Left from the National Assembly next year. The R.P.R. and the U.D.F. also were delighted that, along with minor Rightist parties, they won half of the votes and would not need the 8.4 per cent won by Jean-Marie Le Pen’s National Front, which in the last year has risen from obscurity to be a force in French politics. The R.P.R. and U.D.F. vote total was 33.5 per cent. Diverse Rightist candidates won 16.5 per cent. On the Left, though the Socialists expressed satisfaction with their showing of 25.8 per cent, there was little cause to cheer. The

same was true for the Communist Party, whose 12.9 per cent was marginally up on the 11 per cent it scored in last year’s European elections. Candidates who won a majority of the votes were elected. Where no candidate won a majority, those with 10 per cent or more of the vote were eligible to enter next Sunday’s second round. The Communists and the Socialists have said that in the second round they will support the Leftist candidate with the most votes in the struggle against the Right. The R.P.R. and U.D.F. already have made a similar pact between them and say they will not withdraw in favour of a leading National Front candidate. For the Communists, who have increased their criticism of the Government since they pulled out of the Cabinet last year, the deal

was a matter of necessity. “The situation in which we find ourselves poses problems,” said Jean-Claude Gayssot, a Communist Party spokesman. “We have on one side a policy that we don’t want, and on the other side the Right and the extreme Right.” In spite of the R.P.R.U.D.F. pact on the national level, several local officials have said they will back the National Front in cases where its candidate is better placed. Such moves would give the Left a strong argument against the traditional Right. Mr Le Pen was pleased with his party’s performance, and during post-elec-tion television debates he lashed out at the Right and the Left. The National Front campaigned on themes of anticommunism, anti-immigra-tion, and anti-crime.

“The French have voted for France,” Mr Le Pen said. “With 40 per cent, the Left is beaten, and well beaten. With 30 per cent, the U.D.F.-R.P.R. union is in retreat, and the rest is the National Front and the diverse Right.” Although the National Front’s 8.4 per cent was less than the 11 per cent it won in the European elections in June, it was roughly equivalent in real terms because the Front presented candidates only in about threefourths of the districts. Contesting these local elections for the first time, the Front also did not have the advantage of any incumbents.

The rise of the National Front has been commensurate with the decline of the Communists, who since 1981 have slipped dramatically from their post-war average of 20-22 per cent of the French vote.