With exit polls from the first round of France’s regional elections on Sunday showing the far-right National Front party leading in six out of 13 regions, the unexpected results have made it “clear” that Marine Le Pen’s party may one day rule the country.
Success in the regional elections is a key step on the road to the presidential race in 2017, experts agree.
“The idea is now clear that National Front may be the party that is going to rule France. Regional elections are just a way to test the country’s atmosphere, but it is really the presidential and legislative [general] elections that are the real big game and the big challenge on who’s going to rule France,” political analyst Pierre Schweitzer told RT from Marseille.
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Marine Le Pen, the party’s leader “wants to be ready when the big moment arrives in 2017,” Schweitzer added. “She draws National Front to be a professional party, with people who are really credible on what they are going to do. [They are] professional people, not only protesters [or] people who are only going to criticize things and not do anything,” the analyst said.
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