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Regional defeat rings alarm, not death bell for France's ruling right

By Zhang Xin: 0 Comments Print E-mail Xinhua, March 22, 2010

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France's regional election ended Sunday night, with initial results showing the ruling UMP party has lost all but one of 22 regions to the left wing in metropolitan France.

France's President Nicolas Sarkozy leaves the polling booth before casting his ballot at a Paris polling station in the second round of regional elections March 21, 2010. Sarkozy's centre-right UMP party is due to face heavy losses in regional elections on Sunday that could affect the pace of reform as manoeuvring begins before the 2012 presidential campaign.[Xinhua]

The result was widely considered a loud alarm of public rejection of the current central administration.

The Socialist-led left-wing hailed the victory "unprecedented," but it is still hard to tell to what extent the left unity can use the strong local base to bring out a credible candidate to challenge the ruling right in the 2012 presidential vote.

Defeat -- reflection of public disappointment

During the last poll before the presidential election, left-wing parties have won 54.3 percent of the vote, against 36.1 percent for the ruling UMP party and 8.7 percent for the far-right National Front, according to OpinionWay polling institute.

The Greens party, known as Europe Ecologie, garnered 12.18 percent of votes in the first round, taking a third place only after the leading Socialist and ruling UMP.

As the emerging political power promoted by last year's European election, the Greens has agreed to ally with the Socialist in the second round.

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