The mayor of Paris sank, further dividing by three the score of Benoît Hamon, associated in 2017 with a first historic explosion (6.34%).

According to estimates, it is overtaken by the communist Fabien Roussel, Jean Lassalle and Nicolas Dupont-Aignan.

When the results were announced, the room in southern Paris where the election evening was held froze in silence.

On his leather armchair, Michel, 60, takes off his cap and rubs his forehead.

The PS activist for thirty years, can't believe it: "Frankly I'm knocked out (...) I thought we would do at least 5%", he confides.

Very applauded, Anne Hidalgo spoke quickly, calling for "vote on April 24 against the far right of Marine Le Pen using the Emmanuel Macron ballot".

Socialist candidate Anne Hidalgo speaks to activists on April 10, 2022 in Paris Thomas COEX AFP

A bloodless PS

She also assured that the fight would continue to "oppose the unjust projects of retirement at 65, the rampant privatization of school, university and health, the stigmatization of the poorest and the unemployed, and climate inaction".

The PS, which was in 2012 at the head of all the institutions (presidency, Assembly, Senate), is now bloodless, but still runs 25 departments, five regions and among the largest cities.

But for Sébastien Vincini, PS mayor of Cintegabelle, "the PS is not dead, it is the left that is defeated as a whole".

The score of the mayor of Paris is a "very complicated result but we still have the bases, we have local elected officials", assured Senator Patrick Kanner.

Anne Hidalgo is well below the 5% of the vote threshold to be reimbursed for her campaign expenses, even if the PS has almost entirely self-financed her presidential election.

Socialist presidential candidate Anne Hidalgo, October 23, 2021 at a meeting in Lille THOMAS LO PRESTI AFP

The campaign of Anne Hidalgo, 62, has been a long rout since her declaration of candidacy in September.

The candidate has never been audible, within a scattered left, and has sunk in the polls behind the Insoumis Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the ecologist Yannick Jadot and the communist Fabien Roussel.

"Left too late", for some, victim of a "furious bashing" for others, the candidate got lost at the start of the campaign in a fratricidal duel with Yannick Jadot, and then had part of her its electorate by the short-lived candidacy of Christiane Taubira.

His wish for a left-wing primary, then his refusal to participate in it without Yannick Jadot, also left voters perplexed.

Finally, the candidate failed to bring back the disappointed PS who had voted Emmanuel Macron in 2017.

All eyes are now on the legislative elections.

The First Secretary of the PS Olivier Faure launched "a solemn appeal to the left and ecological forces, to the social forces, to the citizens ready to commit themselves in order to build together for the legislative elections a pact for social and ecological justice" .

Anne Hidalgo also called on "all those who recognize themselves in this left which is already acting together in the territories, to unite" for this ballot.

In a separate statement, several party executives, including Johanna Rolland, mayor of Nantes, also called for "the union of leftist forces and environmentalists."

Beyond this deadline, several socialist personalities, including ex-president François Hollande, who wants to return to the game after 5 years in withdrawal, are preparing for a refoundation in which Anne Hidalgo also wants to take her part.

"Alternative for tomorrow"

"We will work to bring together the dispersed left which has not been able to unite when necessary, from the fall with the social and associative forces", she assured.

A task that promises to be difficult, because of the divisions within the party, as shown on Wednesday evening by the bronca which followed a meeting around the candidate, with in particular François Hollande, but without the First Secretary of the PS Olivier Faure .

The animosity between the two men is notorious.

The Holland legacy still divides, between those who believe that "the liability of hatred" against the PS is not "purged", and those who consider that the party "spent too much time taking inventory" of the ex-president.

Some do not hesitate either to criticize the current leadership, accused of not having worked for five years to rebuild the party.

© 2022 AFP