Photographer: Krisztian Bocsi / Bloomberg
Photographer: Krisztian Bocsi / Bloomberg
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo has said she aims to rally left-wing allies to run against President Emmanuel Macron in the 2022 presidential election.
“I am laying the foundations of a movement that I want to gather people and make proposals to the French,” Hidalgo told Radio Europa on Sunday.
Presidential elections are scheduled for April next year, and current polls show that far-right candidate Marine Le Pen is Macron’s main rival. France also has regional elections in June, although the government has warned that they will only take place if the health context allows.
While polls have so far not been encouraging for the Socialist mayor of Paris, with less than 10% of voting intentions in the first round of elections, a recent poll showed he could reach the second round if he can muster more. party. on the left and the Greens, who intend to run with their own candidate.
Amid criticism of the management of the coronavirus crisis, Macron’s popularity rate fell 4 percentage points in March from a month earlier, with 37% saying people were happy with the president, according to a FIFG survey for the French newspaper Journal du Dimanche. Macron has not said he will run again, but his teams are already working on his re-election.
Paris and about a third of the country closed again on Saturday, with schools open and outdoor activities encouraged, but some non-essential businesses were closed. The complex rules fueled confusion among citizens and led to complaints from store owners deemed non-essential.
The government criticized
The head of the Medef business lobby criticized the government on Saturday for what he called the “persecution” of businesses forced to close. Hidalgo joined the chorus of critics and criticized the government’s lack of transparency when it comes to managing the pandemic, a key election made only by a handful of ministers during so-called “defense cabinet meetings.”
However, the popularity of Macron, who a year ago said France was “at war” with the virus, is even higher than his predecessors, Socialist Francois Hollande and right-wing Nicolas Sarkozy, at the same point in their term, according to the poll. Ifop.