Le Pen win would be a disaster, says Spain’s PM
Spain’s conservative prime minister warned yesterday that an election win by French far-right presidential hopeful Marine Le Pen or Germany’s anti-immigration party AfD would be “a disaster” that would “destroy Europe”.
“I don’t even want to think about it, that would be a disaster, it would simply mean the destruction of Europe,” Mariano Rajoy said during an interview with radio Onda Cero when asked about the possibility of Le Pen or the AfD winning power.
“Mrs Le Pen has announced plans for a referendum. She wants [France]to leave Europe, as if Europe were the source of all misfortunes. I would like it if she visited the rest of the world,” he added.
Promised to dump euro
The National Front presidential candidate has promised if elected in May to dump the euro and organise a Brexit-style referendum on France’s membership in the European Union.
“This is not going to happen. I am convinced that things will turn out alright in Germany and I am absolutely convinced there won’t be a problem in France,” said Rajoy, before adding he hopes conservative nominee Francois Fillon will win the French election.
“It is essential for the future of Europe that the elections in Germany and France go well,” he said.
France’s presidential election will be held on April 23 and May 7. While most opinion polls predict Le Pen will make it to the election’s second round in May, they see her losing that run-off.
In Germany the AfD’s antiimmigrant, Euro-sceptic rhetoric has won support among voters worried about the influx of more than a million migrants in the past two years.
With polls putting it on 12-15 per cent, the party is tipped to win seats in the federal parliament for the first time in September’s national election. rench Socialist Benoit Hamon urged voters to support his bold leftist ideas for revitalising the country on Wednesday as his party prepares to pick its presidential candidate this weekend.
In a final televised debate with his rival, ex-prime minister Manuel Valls, Hamon urged the left to “turn its back on the old regime, at these solutions that didn’t work yesterday and won’t work in the future.”
Hamon, 49, has emerged as the surprise frontrunner to lead the Socialists into elections in April and May after their five years in power which has seen their popularity plummet.
Whoever clinches the nomination on Sunday would finish a humiliating fifth if the vote was held today, polls suggest, as the country grapples with low growth and fears about terrorism and immigration.
Hamon has pitched himself as a man of fresh ideas, promising to bring in universal basic income - a state handout to all adults, irrespective of income - and new environmental protections. He also wants to tax robots to raise income, legalise cannabis, introduce stricter rules to ban more chemical products, and introduce a new corps of state inspectors to combat discrimination.
“I accept saying that we can have bigger deficits,” Hamon said when asked about the impact of his plans on public finances, which were last balanced in France in the 1970s.
Valls, a tough-talking prime minister under unpopular President Francois Hollande until December, has portrayed Hamon as a dreamer who would condemn the left to certain defeat.
“It’s not enough to make people dream, you need to be credible,” he said in one of several sharp exchanges between the former cabinet colleagues.
Valls underlined how Hamon’s programme, which also includes building a second aircraft carrier, was unthinkable without major tax increases.
Pithy put-down
In a pithy put-down to his former education minister, Valls said he wanted to be the “candidate for your payslip”, while Hamon would be the “candidate for the tax form.”
won the first round of voting in the Socialist primary last weekend, with 36 percent of the vote, and has since picked up an endorsement from thirdplaced Arnaud Montebourg.
The battle in the secondround run-off this Sunday has been widely depicted as a struggle between the centrist, pro-business wing of the party represented by Valls and the leftist faction behind Hamon.
This ideological split has caused tension throughout Hollande’s five years in power and has led to what could be fatal fractures ahead of the vote.
Two other formerly Socialist candidates are set to appear on the ballot in April, namely 39-year-old centrist ex-economy minister Emmanuel Macron and Communist-backed JeanLuc Melenchon.
Hamon’s success in the primary could open up more space in the centre ground for Macron, a former banker who has been drawing large crowds at rallies around the country.
France’s election has been portrayed by polls as a battle between the front-running rightwing Republicans party candidate Francois Fillon and the far-right leader Marine Le Pen.
But many analysts caution that it is still highly unpredictable.
Fillon was hit Wednesday by a potentially damaging investigation into the employment of his wife as a parliamentary aide following revelations in a newspaper.
Hamon’s proposal to introduce universal basic income took centre stage in Wednesday night’s discussion.
His medium-term plan sometime after 2020 - is to introduce a payment of around 750 euros (Dh2,938; $800) a month to everyone in a radical overhaul of the welfare system.