- In the first round of the municipal elections, the environmentalists carried out a significant boost, confirming their positive results for the Europeans.
- Arriving in first position in several big cities, EELV hopes to win several town halls next June 28.
- But the “anti-ecological fronts” of the right and LREM, as well as the difficulties of alliance with the PS, could complicate the task.
A green wave to come? In the first round of the municipal elections, the environmentalists carried out a significant boost, confirming their good results at the Europeans in 2019. Arriving in first position in several large cities, EELV hopes to win several town halls next June 28. But the "anti-ecological fronts" and the tensions with the PS could complicate the task.
Confirming the dynamics despite the “anti-ecological fronts”
"In the first round, we registered a record number of 121 lists in municipalities with more than 30,000 inhabitants, almost double the number in 2014," notes EELV MEP David Cormand. “This increase in strength was confirmed in the results, since we almost always beat our scores in the cities where we presented ourselves, arriving first in Lyon, Besançon, Strasbourg and Grenoble, and being in the position of challengers in Toulouse or Bordeaux ”, continues the former party boss.
But faced with this green push, sometimes carried out without the support of the PS, local negotiations between the right and La République en Marche took place in between the two towers. "There is an anti-ecological front which is created", was annoyed Tuesday the current national secretary of EELV Julien Bayou on Sud Radio. “LR and LREM are organizing an anti-climate coalition to block environmentalists in Lyon and Bordeaux. "
In the capital of the Rhône, the ecological candidate Grégory Doucet (28.46%) will have to face the alliance between Etienne Blanc (LR, 17.01%) and the colt of Gérard Collomb Yann Cucherat (LREM, 14 , 92%). Same type of union in the Lyon metropolis, but also in Bordeaux, Strasbourg, or Clermont-Ferrand (EELV is here in a union list led by the PS). In Toulouse, the outgoing LR mayor Jean-Luc Moudenc, supported by LREM, also called for a "barrage of red vests", denouncing the alliance between environmentalists and rebellious. "These LR-LREM mergers are made on an anti-ecological substrate, but they clarify in these cities the stake of the second round: a political offer from the right or an ecological proposal from the assembled left," confides David Cormand.
Municipal results over 20 Minutes
Sometimes difficult alliances with former socialist allies
In several of the cities where they were not allied with the PS from the first round, environmentalists have signed agreements with the socialists for the second, as in Paris, Nantes, Le Mans, Rouen or Nancy. But the green push has also sometimes created tensions with their traditional allies, making discussions fail like in Lille, Dijon, Grenoble, Le Havre, or Strasbourg.
In the capital of the Grand-Est, Jeanne Barseghian, EELV candidate who came first on March 15 (almost 28%), will face the alliance between Alain Fontanel (LREM) and Jean-Philippe Vetter (LR) on June 28, but also to the socialist candidate Catherine Trautmann (19.8%), for lack of agreement. "We worked for weeks to get it, but there were two stumbling blocks: on road projects and on the distribution of positions for the city," says Jeanne Barseghian. “The list I led came out on top with almost 9 points ahead, so we wanted proportional lists. Because the balance of power has been reversed, the ecological question is now at the heart of concerns. "
The former socialist minister accuses her, the ecologists of having "played the watch" to make the agreement collapse, denouncing practices worthy ... "of the old PS". Olivier Faure also denounced in his own way the hubris of the greens to explain the failure of the negotiations between the two parties in certain municipalities. "There are environmentalists who want to take their revenge on history and now seek to have an attitude which corresponds to that which we, we, may have had in other times by seeking to impose ourselves on the coalition", a lamented Tuesday on France 2 the boss of the socialists.
"Some socialists did not want to give up a form of hegemony, and if environmentalists were tolerable for them at 15%, they became infrequent at 25%", replies David Cormand. The green dynamic should also depend on the mobilization on June 28. Turnout had reached a historically low record in the first round (44%). And according to an Ifop survey, abstention was much higher among voters who had voted EELV in the European elections in 2019 (at 60%) than among those who had opted for other parties (42% for the PS or 40 % for LR).
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