Despite the far-left New Popular Front winning the second round of elections, riots broke out in France after leftist radicals had gathered in anticipation of a potential victory of Marine Le Pen’s populist National Rally.
Ahead of the second round of voting on Saturday, the government mobilised 30,000 police officers, including 5,000 in Paris, in expectation of riots from the far-left if the populist right repeated its success in the first round of the snap elections called by French President Macron.
Black bloc Antifa-style radicals were filmed setting fire to street furniture and bicycles, as well as shooting fireworks and other projectiles at police as they ran ruff shot through the French capital. Demonstrators were seen waving Palestinian and Antifa flags.
Protests and riots have also broken out in Rennes, Lyon, Marseilles and other cities across France, Le Figaro reports.
While the New Popular Front alliance between socialists, radical environmentalists, and outright communists won the most seats, currently being projected to have secured between 187 and 198 seats in the National Assembly, the far left still showed their violent edge, clashing with police in Paris and other cities on Sunday evening.
Although Macron had warned that voting for either the populist right or the far-left socialist-communist alliance would lead to “civil war” in France, in a desperate bid to prevent the National Rally from taking over the legislature, he partnered with the leftist New Popular Front in an election alliance for the second round.
Over the coming days, there will be wrangling to form a governing coalition, with Macron’s deputy, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal announcing his resignation on Sunday evening. Far-left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon has demanded that Macron either resign or appoint a member of his New Popular Front as the next prime minister.
Marine Le Pen, her deputy Jordan Bardella, and the disputed leader of the centre-right Les Républicains Éric Ciotti have denounced Macron’s election pact with the far-left as an “alliance of dishonour”.
Contrary to the scare tactics deployed by Macron, the French political establishment, and the legacy media concerning the rise of the so-called “far-right”, it has been Macron’s new leftist partners such as Mélenchon who have been broadly supportive of political violence and riots over the past year in France.
Commenting before the election about the accusations against her party somehow being a threat to democracy, Le Pen said: “The extreme left has been violent for years… and this completely unpunished. Macron said: ‘Either me or the chaos’. He is the chaos! We, on the other hand, embody calm and order. The RN has never organized a demonstration against election results, has never prevented an opponent’s rally, and has never turned the National Assembly into a zone to be defended.”
