Macron glows green as he pitches for support of Leftists and young
Incumbent leads Le Pen by 10 points but will need to persuade abstainers to come on board to seal win
EMMANUEL MACRON yesterday chose the sweltering melting pot of Marseille in which to paint himself green as he attempted to secure key Leftist and youth votes and clinch a second term, warning that his rival, Marine Le Pen, was an “incompetent climate sceptic”.
The centrist incumbent’s biggest rally of the second round so far, held at the Pharo gardens overlooking Marseille’s old port, coincided with demonstrations in the Mediterranean port city and around the country “against the farRight”.
But many Leftists in Marseille, the constituency of third-placed Jean-Luc Mélenchon, made it clear they were unsure whether they would vote for either candidate, deeming it a choice between “the plague and cholera”.
In temperatures of 27 degrees Celsius well suited to a speech about global warming, the 44-year old told a crowd of several thousand that green issues would shape his policies if he was reelected and a “prime minister directly in charge of environmental planning” would oversee them.
The pledge, which was not in his manifesto, was a major concession to supporters of Mr Mélenchon, who had called for a €200billion spending spree to tackle climate change.
Both candidates have promised to ramp up France’s nuclear industry but have starkly contrasting views on renewable energy. Ms Le Pen has pledged to tear down wind farms, while Mr Macron wants to speed up the transition to wind and solar power.
“The far-Right is a climate-sceptic project,” warned Mr Macron as polls suggested his lead over his nationalist rival had increased slightly. An IpsosSopra-Steria survey predicted he would win 55.5 per cent of the vote on Sunday and Ms Le Pen 44.5 per cent.
He also singled out multicultural Marseille, France’s second most populous city and its oldest, as a symbol of his vision of Gallic “openness” against “the great division” that he said lay in store if Ms Le Pen clinched power.
Criticising her plans to inscribe “national preference” into the constitution, he said: “French pride… is not a great separation that consists of telling children born on our soil in our Republic that they no longer have their place and they no longer have their rights.”
Critics argue that the Macron administration has twice been convicted for failing to honour climate commitments made during his term of office.
“I hear the anxiety that exists in a lot of our young people. I see young people, adolescents, who are fearful about the future of our planet,” Mr Macron told the rally, adding that he would make France “the first major nation to abandon gas, oil and coal”.
Calling the election a “choice of civilisation”, he said: “April 24 is a referendum for or against” the EU, ecology, youth and the Republic, repeating the refrain.
He told Leftists thinking of abstaining: “Don’t be brainwashed into thinking that the far-Right is the same as us. No it is not the same.”
That sentiment was echoed in marches across France on Saturday where some protesters insisted the farRight must be stopped at all costs but other banners read: “Boycott the second round” or “massive abstention”.
For her part, Ms Le Pen has pulled out the stops to convince Mr Mélenchon’s voters that Mr Macron poses the greatest threat. Aping the language of the far-Left in a rally in nearby Avignon on Thursday, she framed the election as an anti-Macron referendum pitting “the people against the oligarchy” that is embodied by her former investment banker rival.
Removing any sign of her name or party on banners, Ms Le Pen sought to widen her appeal to those who didn’t vote for her in round one by saying: “Patriots of the Right, the Left or elsewhere, our only party is France.”
As an Olympique Marseille football club supporter, Mr Macron has long professed to having a soft spot for the flamboyant but crumbling port city whose problems of drugs, gun-crime and corruption came into sharp focus in recent hit movie Bac Nord.
He has visited the city six times in five years, most recently to launch a €1.5billion investment in schools, transport, housing and security from the same spot last year. He had intended to kick off his re-election campaign in the city, but had to cancel it due to the war in Ukraine.
The choice of Marseille yesterday made perfect electoral sense. The city voted overwhelmingly for Mr Mélenchon in round one and his supporters may well hold the key to the outcome.
While the fiery Unbowed France leader has called on his supporters not to cast “a single Le Pen vote”, he has made no clarion call to vote Macron, leaving that decision to the conscience of his followers.