French presidential: Marine Le Pen's score in Overseas is "unpublished"

The counting of the votes in a polling station in Guyana, April 23, 2022. © Jody Amiet - AFP

Text by: RFI Follow

1 min

One of the surprises of the second round happened in Overseas.

Marine Le Pen came first in most territories (apart from New Caledonia, French Polynesia and Wallis and Futuna) with often very high scores: nearly 70% of the vote in Guadeloupe, 60% in Martinique.

The two islands had been shaken by a violent challenge to the health pass and the vaccination obligation for caregivers.

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Two Caribbean islands, Martinique and Guadeloupe, are stricken by poverty and a high unemployment rate, they have been shaken by a virulent challenge to the obligation to vaccinate against Covid-19 for caregivers and firefighters.

The far-right candidate also won 54.73% in Saint-Barthélemy.

Massive rejection of Emmanuel Macron also in Guyana, where the National Rally candidate won 60.7% of the vote, and in Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon, with 50.69%, according to figures released Sunday evening by the ministry French Interior.

As well as Reunion (59.57%),

(59.10%).

In most territories,

had achieved significant scores in the first round, or even came first for some.

Emmanuel Macron, for his part, won in the South Pacific, obtaining 61.04% in New Caledonia, 51.80% in French Polynesia and 67.44% in Wallis and Futuna.

What is extremely new, and which we do not find in the rest of France, is a form of translation.

The voters who had chosen Jean-Luc Mélenchon in the first round, we chose Marine Le Pen in the second round.

I see two key explanations, but you have to be very careful, you have to look at territory by overseas territory.

But if I take the West Indies and Guyana for example, we see that it is more a health anger that has manifested itself.

Voters did not necessarily choose Marine Le Pen in full support of his entire program, but reacted against Emmanuel Macron's policy.

Dissatisfaction and dissatisfaction with the way the state has handled the health crisis, let's remember the winter of 2021, with the dispatch of law enforcement,

finally a very repressive logic.

Then there was also a subject that is common to all Overseas: there is a very strong social question.

In a context excluding inflation, the question of the high cost of living, the question of access to a certain number of basic necessities, so adding a context of inflation, a context of health tensions, that was prohibitive for Emmanuel Macron, who lost the high scores in all these territories, because it was almost a plebiscite in 2017.

For Martial Foucault, professor at Sciences Po in Paris, holder of the chair on the Overseas Territories, the "translation" of voters from Jean-Luc Mélenchon to Marine Le Pen is "unpublished"

Valerie Cohen

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• Overseas

• France

• Presidential France 2022

• French politics

• Marine Le Pen

• Emmanuel Macron