Macron’s party is set for parliament assault
‘Remember past wars’
PARIS, June 10, (Agencies): The year-old centrist party of French President Emmanuel Macron prepared Saturday for the first round of parliamentary elections looking set to grab the lead in the race for a clear majority.
Macron swept away far-right candidate Marine Le Pen to win the presidency on May 7, but has only achieved half the job.
Macron’s Republique en Marche (Republic on the Move, REM) party, which he only founded in April 2016 as a platform for his presidential bid, now needs a commanding majority in the National Assembly for him to implement the reforms he promised on the campaign trail.
A host of opinion polls show Macron’s party could take around 30 percent of the first-round vote on Sunday, which would put it in pole position to secure an absolute majority in the second round a week later.
That could equate to as many as 400 seats in the 577seat chamber.
“A wave or a tsunami?” asked the front page of the leftwing daily Liberation on Saturday.
REM has already had a boost after its candidates came first in 10 of the 11 French overseas constituencies that have already voted.
The legislative elections are, like the presidential contest, held over two rounds.
If no candidate wins over 50 percent in the first round, the two top-placed go into the second round — as well as any candidate who won the votes of over 12.5 percent of the electorate.
Macron
World War II massacre marked:
French President Emmanuel Macron has called on young people to remember past wars and use democratic means to fight against today’s barbarities during a commemoration at the site of the deadliest massacre in Nazioccupied France.
Macron told 500 children aged 12 to 16 in Oradoursur-Glane in western France that “we would like to be able to say that from now on this happens away from home or that it no longer happens.
But Rwanda or Yugoslavia yesterday, Syria today. They are only a few hours by plane.”
Voter on trial for helping a migrant:
She may once have voted for France’s anti-immigrant National Front, but now she faces possible jail time for helping the Iranian refugee she fell in love with.
Beatrice Huret insists she has no regrets and believes she has done nothing wrong.
On June 27 however, she goes on trial for offering aid to a foreigner and in theory at least, faces a jail term of up to 10 years.
It has been a long journey for someone who used to leaflet for the National Front, the far-right party that campaigns on a fiercely anti-immigrant platform.
Huret, a dark-haired woman of 44, lives in the Calais area of northern France, where in recent years thousands of migrants have gathered awaiting their chance to cross the Channel to England — legally or illegally.
‘Air Cocaine’ smuggler transferred:
A FrenWchman sentenced to 20 years’ jail in the Dominican Republic over a plot to smuggle a planeload of drugs has been transferred to France for health reasons, his lawyer said.
Alain Castany, one of four Frenchmen convicted in the so-called “Air Cocaine” case, arrived in France on Friday morning for medical treatment, lawyer Karim Beylouni told AFP.
Castany, 70, has been hospitalised after a motorcycle knocked him over while he was out on bail.