Paris (AFP)
"You have chosen a Paris that breathes": with its resolutely green campaign, the outgoing mayor PS Anne Hidalgo largely prevailed in Paris on Sunday, according to first estimates, facing a right which held its positions and a presidential majority which has completely collapsed.
"Particularly moved", surrounded by her assistants on the forecourt of the Hôtel de Ville, the 61-year-old socialist hailed a "collective victory", thanks to an "ecological, social and humanist alliance for the future of Paris". Formally, she still has to wait for the Paris Council on Friday to be officially re-elected.
According to initial estimates, Ms. Hidalgo is in the lead, obtaining between 49.3% and 50.2% of the vote, far ahead of Rachida Dati (31.7 to 32.7%) and Agnès Buzyn (from 13.7 to 16 %). It would thus collect a hundred seats for its coalition Paris en Commun, against fifty for the LR right and from 6 to 12 only for the presidential majority.
"In a triangular", this score is "quite exceptional", rejoiced Jean-Louis Missika, president of the Paris en Commun platform, which brings together socialists, ecologists, communists or members of Generation.s. "It means that the confidence of the Parisians who was evident in the first round has been confirmed and amplified".
The PS retains the capital after 19 years of reign: 13 years of mandate of Bertrand Delanoë then six of the outgoing mayor, his heiress and former first deputy Anne Hidalgo.
His strategy paid off. By endorsing a resolutely ecological program, the outgoing mayor contained his EELV partners in the first round, then obtained their support.
It is a triumph for a city council very contested during its mandate, criticized for the pedestrianization of the quays of the Seine, the brutal stop of the car-sharing service Autolib, the fiasco of the new version of Vélib 'or the cancellation by justice of a City advertising market with JCDecaux.
The first round on March 15 had already given a clear advantage to the socialist mayor, who came largely ahead (29.3%) ahead of Rachida Dati (22.7%) and Agnès Buzyn (17.3%). Since then, the ranking has remained unchanged in all opinion polls.
- Explosion in flight -
For La République en Marche (LREM), the defeat concludes a calamitous campaign where the insults have multiplied: the dissidence of Cédric Villani, the explosion in flight of the campaign of Benjamin Griveaux after the dissemination of intimate videos, then the blunders and the hesitations of his replacement, the former Minister of Health Agnès Buzyn, weakened by his explosive comments on the "masquerade" of the first round, against the backdrop of an epidemic of coronavirus.
The second round also seems even more difficult than expected.
On the LR side, Rachida Dati, re-elected in the first round in the 7th arrondissement, will have succeeded in mobilizing her electorate on the ground, with an energetic campaign, centered on the fundamentals of the right, in the former fiefdom of Jacques Chirac then Jean Tiberi.
But it will have lacked reserve of votes throughout this unprecedented campaign, hit hard by the Covid-19.
"We measure all the way accomplished, we were given 8% at the start of the campaign," reacted Nelly Garnier, campaign director for Ms. Dati. "We can regret the lack of union against Anne Hidalgo. Agnes Buzyn will assume her strategy and her results," she said.
Confident of her strength, Anne Hidalgo advanced as the big favorite of this second round. As a symbol, she had already mentioned during the week the measures of her next mandate, including the sustainability of the cycle paths set up during deconfinement or the pedestrianization of the surroundings of the Saint-Martin canal.
Leaving to give ideas: questioned during a trip, Thursday, on a possible candidacy for the presidential election of 2022, Anne Hidalgo swore: "Especially not!"
Its campaign platform, "Paris en Commun", however, will become a "long-term political structure" and its current president, Jean-Louis Missika, calls for the creation of a "federation" with the citizens' lists poised to win in several large cities.
With in particular the mission to "prepare the next electoral deadlines" ...
bat-adc-rl-pr / bfa / cb
© 2020 AFP