Paris (AFP)

A dozen candidates already declared, others waiting for a nomination, an outgoing mayor in ambush: six months of the first round of municipal in Paris, the cast is expanded, but the strategies and the balance of power are still badly known.

"What is likely to happen in cities with over 10,000 inhabitants will be amplified in Paris," predicts AFP Frederic Dabi, the director general of IFOP, which is preparing to publish a new poll on Sunday elections Municipalities in Paris. The political scientist prognostic including "the end of right-left polarization", a "scattering of political forces".

In the cabinet of outgoing PS Mayor Anne Hidalgo, whose candidacy should be officialized in December, it is said to expect "triangular or quadrangular" in some districts, including the 14th, where the outgoing mayor Carine Petit (Generations) , likely candidate for the team of Anne Hidalgo, could face the LREM dissident candidate Cédric Villani (registered on the electoral rolls the day after his declaration) and the Secretary of State for Gender Equality Marlène Schiappa.

"This is the most bizarre campaign," says a longtime strategist and close friend of Mrs. Hidalgo. "In 2014, the candidates were known, but today, the two candidates who can apply for alternation are not there: LR and LREM."

At LR (The Republicans), candidates for the nomination Rachida Dati, Marie-Claire Carrere-Gee and Jean-Pierre Lecoq will have to wait until October to know the choice of their party.

And among the Walkers, calls for the rally were not heard after the investiture in the pain of the former government spokesman, Benjamin Griveaux. The party has been divided since Cédric Villani announced his candidacy last week.

"We could not have dreamed of a better scenario," explains a PS official, while another is delighted that the mathematician Villani takes votes "to Benjamin Griveaux and the ecologists". From now on, he believes, "Benjamin Griveaux's goal will no longer be to beat Anne Hidalgo, but Cédric Villani".

- "Tom Thumb" -

The Parisian municipal campaign is also marked by numerous applications from outsiders, who are trying to make their way alongside these behemoths.

Pierre-Yves Bournazel, center-right candidate, wants to "embody the alternative". "I'm a Tom Thumb and a Tom Thumb, it sows pebbles," believes the one who has been elected in Paris for 11 years.

"Can Gaspard Gantzer (founder of Parisiennes, Parisiens, and candidate for mayor of Paris) be the receptacle of disappointed? Can Cédric Villani be a point of balance between the + anti-Griveaux + and the disappointed Anne Hidalgo? ", also wonders Frederic Dabi.

What about the ecologists of EELV, after their good results in the European elections placing them second in Paris (with nearly 20%)?

"Never had a green campaign started so well," says their candidate David Belliard, who will hold a meeting in Paris on September 24th. While his voice will be coveted for the second round, Mr. Belliard extends his hand to "all those who want to carry this project with us" to join them behind them.

"How EELV can build a narrative of rupture with the mayor of Paris," wonders Frédéric Dabi, "when they were for six years in the majority?"

Still, each of the candidates has their eyes riveted on the first poll expected Sunday, which will shed light on the balance of power.

Wanting above the arena, Anne Hidalgo will visit her supporters gathered around "Paris in Common" (campaign structure led by his relatives), before the publication, September 25, a book entitled " The place of possibilities ".

© 2019 AFP