Tuesday, Apr 23, 2002
Tuesday, Apr 23, 2002 |
| International | ||
|
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Miscellaneous |
Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary | International
By Vaiju Naravane
Mr. Le Pen, who beat the Socialist Prime Minister, Lionel Jospin, to second place behind the incumbent Gaullist President, Jacques Chirac, will now be in the second round run-off on May 5. Mr. Chirac's score, a little less than 20 per cent of the votes cast is the lowest ever for a first round topper. A mere two percentage points separate him from Mr. Le Pen who polled 17.2 per cent of the vote. Shortly after the results were announced, Mr. Jospin who led a lacklustre, uninspiring and incoherent campaign declared he was retiring from public life, leaving the Socialists without an effective leadership in the parliamentary elections slated for mid June. Mr. Le Pen cleverly exploited the sense of disaffection present among working class people who feel let down by the political establishment. Playing on fear, he successfully raised the bogey of immigrant Arab criminality. The shock waves reverberated across Europe and newspapers were unanimous in describing the event as an earthquake. Not one, not the candidates, nor the media, the polling institutes or political commentators had ever imagined such a scenario. Opinion polls had indicated in recent weeks that Mr. Le Pen's popularity was on the rise but they consistently and confidently predicted a second round run off between Mr. Chirac and Mr. Jospin. As the results came in and Mr. Le Pen's face showed up on screens next to Mr. Chirac's, there were scenes of grief and shock at Mr. Jospin's campaign headquarters in Paris. Leftists staged a spontaneous protest at the Place de la Bastille in the capital with an estimated 20,000 persons gathering where the French Revolution started in 1789. Police fired teargas shells to disperse a crowd of violent youth at the Place de la Concorde in Paris. Some of the protesters smashed shop windows, including those of the famous Parisian restaurant, Maxim's. ``Ashamed and disheartened is how I feel today. This has come about because of a strange coming together of factors. Where does one begin to apportion blame? The politicians, of course, for being so far removed from the electorate, for their smug certainty; but also the polling institutes who systematically led the media to project a traditional left versus right duel as a foregone conclusion. We must also blame the protest voters who contributed to the fragmentation of the vote and the abstentionists who shirked their duty, opening the way for this disaster," political scientist Olivier Duhamel told The Hindu. Although the traditional leftist vote was split between at least eight candidates, the combined Left won only 27 per cent of the vote. The traditional Right fared only marginally better with 31 per cent of the vote. The extreme Right, between Mr. Le Pen and his former deputy and current rival, Bruno Megret, has emerged the clear victor, with over 20 per cent. The French communist party was decimated, scoring less than four per cent. This vote signifies a radicalisation of politics in France as many left-wing voters abandoned their traditional base to vote for the anti-European, anti free market message of the former Interior Minister, Jean Pierre Chevenement and the anti-globalisation message of Trotskyists like Arlette Laguiller and Olivier Besancenot who scored over 10 per cent. Left-wing leaders called on the population to vote for Mr. Chirac in the second round to keep the extreme right out. The real test will come in the legislative elections in June when there are bound to be triangular contests in the first round. The votes of National Front candidates will be a deciding factor. These results are being seen as a source of national shame. France was a fierce advocate of diplomatic sanctions against Austria when the extreme right-wing Freedom Party joined the Government there a couple of years ago. More recently, France has been critical of Silvio Berlusconi for his pact with the Allianza Nazionale, the reformed former Italian Fascist party and the xenophobic anti-foreigner Northern League. The French derided Italian voters for choosing Mr. Berlusconi who has several cases of financial irregularity pending against him. The French now have done no better. Mr. Chirac has used his presidential immunity to shield himself from investigations into a string of alleged corruption charges. (Concluded)
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Miscellaneous |
|
|
|
The Hindu Group: Home | About Us | Copyright | Archives | Contacts | Subscription Group Sites: The Hindu | Business Line | The Sportstar | Frontline | Home |
Copyright © 2002, The
Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of
this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of
The Hindu
|