The RN vote confirms its progression in Overseas

Paris (AFP)

"Barriers jumped" in the Overseas, which for the first time have mainly placed the National Rally at the head of an election, at the European, analysts analyze.

The list of the National Gathering almost made the Grand Slam in Overseas, only three overseas territories (Martinique, Wallis and Futuna) out of eleven who Sunday placed the party of Emmanuel Macron in first position.

In these territories marked by a high abstention (between 65% in Wallis and Futuna and 86% in French Guiana), Mayotte even offers the RN its best national score (45.56%), and in Reunion, where the party gets 31, 2% of the votes, he is in the lead in all the communes.

"The RN confirms a slow progression in the overseas," says Justin Daniel, professor of political science at the University of the West Indies. "From a confidential score obtained by the list of Jean-Marie Le Pen in 1999 (2.67%), one passes in 2019 to a triumph of the list RN" in a majority of territories.

"This progress was contained in the results of the presidential election of 2017", where Marine Le Pen had achieved "scores so unequaled," he adds.

It was already a "breakthrough", with 23.83% of votes in the first round, confirms Christiane Rafidinarivo, political scientist and research associate at Cevipof. "But the FN came in second place in eight territories out of 11 and first in none, and in the second round, it was beaten with 35.60% of the vote," she adds.

For Daniel Justin, "for a long time, the speech of the National Front has struggled to take in societies stemming from the colonial and / or slavery matrix.Today, this speech has become commonplace to the point of sometimes being the object a form of membership, a psychological threshold has been crossed and barriers have

Both recall that "Jean-Marie Le Pen has never been able to set foot in Martinique", and that in the face of hostility, his daughter has also given up to go to the West Indies. But for the Europeans, "Jordan Bardella was able to go there, in all discretion but also in peace," notes Daniel Justin.

"The long and strong political mobilization of Overseas against the FN and the RN has been a bulwark", considers Christiane Rafidinarivo, but "today, the new ways of information reach the electorate well before the electoral visits and without always the filter of the political parties or other leaders of opinion ".

- "identity fiber" -

For Daniel Justin, "it would be futile to deny that the speech of the RN finds a favorable echo in several ultramarine territories". "By posing as stripped of its racist and xenophobic hints while cultivating withdrawal, by making it one of the modalities of the fight against immigration (...), the party resonates with certain expectations or fears expressed locally ".

He also emphasizes that "the importance of the social question, the feeling that things have not fundamentally changed after the great crisis of 2009 in the West Indies and Guyana, the inconclusive results of the measures against the expensive life and in favor of real equality + and the growing sense of insecurity (...) are fertile ground "for the RN.

In addition, "the + localism + displayed RN, associated with the anti-European charge, can vibrate the fiber of identity in some territories," he analysis.

Another factor emphasized by Rafidinarivo: the party has put "Ultramarins in eligible position on its list", including the Guadeloupe Maxette Grisoni-Pirbakas, elected MEP. Guadeloupe voted RN at 23.7%.

And by abandoning his speech "Frexit", the party has scored points "in the outermost European Regions" (West Indies, Guyana, Mayotte, Reunion), "which have particularly appropriate European citizenship and are largely funded by the EU" , judges the political scientist.

Lastly, it notes that participation, although lower than in France, is on the rise in 2019 in overseas France, and "has benefited more the RN whose electoral mobilization of the members is more active".

For Justin Daniel, "the nature of the European election undoubtedly favors a party like the RN: it does not necessarily need local relay to be heard (...)". But "more difficult will be for such a party, the next deadlines, including municipal".

? 2019 AFP