Anti-Immigration Party Wins Again: This Time in France

• 12.08.2015, 11:18
•  Europe,  World

Marion Marechal-Le Pen and Marine Le Pen

The anti-immigration Front National (FN) party led by Marine Le Pen received around 28 percent of the votes in the regional elections and topped the list in at least 6 of 13 regions, the Interior Ministry informs based on the final estimations.

The FN came ahead of both former president Nicolas Sarkozy’s Les Republicains (formerly the UMP), which earned 27 percent, and President François Hollande’s Socialists, with 23.5 percent, France 24 reports.

Le Pen and her 25-year-old niece Marion Marechal-Le Pen broke the symbolic 40 percent mark in their respective regions, shattering previous records for the party as they tapped into voter anger over a stagnant economy and security fears.

Surfing on the anger and anxiety following the terror attacks in Paris, the allegedly ''cleaned-up'' far-right party led the polls in six out of 12 new super-regions created in mainland France last year.

Marine Le Pen said the result showed that the FN was now the ''biggest single political party in France''. She added: ''It is a magnificent result that we will treat with humility and a profound sense of responsibility''. 

She added that the results proved the party was 'without contest the first party of France'.

Le Pen called on all ''patriots'' to back her party in the second round and ''turn their backs on this political class that deceives them''.

According to The Independent, she also reminded voters that some of the Paris murderers, including suicide bombers at the Stade de France, are said to have entered Europe from Syria as alleged asylum seekers. 
In a statement issued three weeks ahead of the regional elections, National Front said one of the attackers had arrived in Greece the previous month and they were among the mass of migrants who flow into Europe each day.

"This is a historic, extraordinary result," FN lawmaker Marion Marechal-Le Pen said in her turn, "The old system died tonight." Marechal-Le Pen, the granddaughter of party founder Jean-Marie Le Pen, led the first round in southeast France with 40.9 percent, Reuters writes.

However, Marine Le Pen is dangerous not only for her extreme right-wing views. It is during the years of her leadership of the party that she was able to get rid of her father Jean-Marie Le Pen, the creator of the party and taking the power over the party. If you also take into account Le Pen's promises to mitigate the new taxes introduced by the Socialists, she becomes a serious contender for both Hollande and Sarkozy.

Besides, against the backdrop of Islamophobia, which is raising its head in the country, Marine Le Pen's victory cannot be considered accidental and, on the contrary, was quite predictable.

The FN's success comes as an uncontrolled wave of hundreds of thousands of refugees from conflict and poverty in the Middle East, Asia and Africa boosts support for eurosceptic parties across Europe, from Germany's AfD party to Britain's anti-EU UK Independence Party, from the newly elected Law and Justice government in Poland to the anti-migration party in Denmark.

The same tendency has also been seen in Norway and Switzerland recently, though these countries are not a part of the EU, but being on the European Continent they are also constantly suffering from the huge migrant flows. 

And the anti-immigration parties in EU member states are struggling against the EU quota system and other EU levels initiatives longing to gain some sovereignty in migrant connected issues.