The far-right National Rally party and its allies topped the results of the first round of early legislative elections in France, winning more than 34% of the votes, according to preliminary estimates, amid record voter participation in decades.

The extreme right prevailed over the left-wing coalition or the “National Popular Front” (between 28.5 and 29.1%), as well as the camp of President Emmanuel Macron (20.5 to 21.5%), according to these estimates.

The National Rally may obtain a large relative majority in the National Assembly (Parliament) and perhaps an absolute majority, according to the expectations of three centers.

The French Ministry of the Interior said that the participation rate reached approximately 60% as of five o’clock in the evening local time, while voting continues until six o’clock in the evening in most polling stations, and eight o’clock in the evening in major cities, including the capital, Paris.

Dissolution of Parliament
These elections come after President Emmanuel Macron's decision on June 9 to dissolve Parliament following the far-right's rise to first place in the European elections.

The recorded participation rate is the highest since the first round of the 1978 legislative elections in France, with the exception of the 1986 vote, which took place according to the proportional system and in one round.
In the voting offices, a large number of voters did not hide their concern about these early elections.
Roxanne Le Brun (40 years old), a voter in Bordeaux (southwest), said, "I would like to restore calm because everything has taken a worrying turn since the European elections."

In the neighborhoods north of the city of Marseille on the Mediterranean, which contain a large number of residents of immigrant origins, Nabil Aghini (40 years old) decided to cast his vote despite not participating in the European elections. He said, “As long as the option is available, it is better to go and vote.”

Many French politicians took the initiative to cast their votes in the morning. President Macron did so in Touquet (northwest), while far-right leader Marine Le Pen voted in Henin-Beaumont in the north.

An unprecedented scenario
The far-right National Rally party, headed by Jordan Bardella (28 years old), has 34 to 37% of vote intentions in opinion polls, which may lead to an unprecedented scenario with it obtaining a relative or absolute majority after the second round on the seventh of next July. .

If Bardella becomes prime minister, this will be the first time that France has been ruled by a far-right government since World War II.

Otherwise, there is a real danger that France will have a faltering National Assembly without the possibility of forming alliances between highly polarized camps, which threatens to plunge France into the unknown.

In its modern history, France has known three periods of coexistence between a president and a government of different orientations, during the eras of both Presidents François Mitterrand (1986-1988 and 1993-1995) and Jacques Chirac (1997-2002).

The results of the vote did not indicate whether the National Rally party would be able to form a government alongside Macron’s pro-European Union coalition.

There is now a week remaining until the runoff, scheduled for July 7. The final result will depend on the extent to which the parties are willing to unite their forces in each of France's 577 electoral districts in the second round.

The parties belonging to the center-right and center-left cooperated in the past if they saw that the “National Rally” party was close to assuming power in the country. But that may not happen this time.