For all his bombast, France’s veteran far right firebrand Jean-Marie Le Pen probably never expected to survive to see the party he created reach the gates of power.
But the first round of parliamentary elections on Sunday has brought France to the brink of historic political change.
Just past his 96th birthday and in ailing health, Mr Le Pen was cast aside long ago as part of his daughter Marine’s pursuit of mainstream success.
The militaristic title Front National (National Front) was ditched in favour of the more unifying Rassemblement National (National Rally), encouraging voters to feel comfortable about giving their support. Strenuous efforts were made to shrug off the stigma of racism and anti-Semitism that was such a feature of Jean-Marie Le Pen’s leadership.
And how well the strategy of detoxification has worked.
The snap election, which President Emmanuel Macron must now bitterly regret calling, has left National Rally (RN) certain to be the biggest parliamentary group after next Sunday’s decisive second round with every possibility of forming an absolute majority.
That would produce an uneasy period of political “cohabitation”. The centrist Mr Macron would remain untouchable at the Elysee Palace unless he chose to cut short his second term but Miss Le Pen’s young lieutenant Jordan Bardella would be installed as prime minister.
Mr Bardella, 28, sharp-suited and a master of effective communication, has already anticipated success with some preliminary work on forming his cabinet. Overtures to business leaders have made some progress in overcoming past doubts about RN’s ability to manage the economy.
Hailing Sunday’s results as “a verdict without appeal”, Mr Bardella promises to be a prime minister for all French people, sharing power responsibly but firmly. He pledges a “hard cohabitation” in which he is ready to stand up to Mr Macron whenever necessary.
The scene for this tumultuous turn of events was set by the President’s knee jerk reaction in calling an election after the RN scored sweeping successes in last month’s voting for the European Parliament.
He had no need to go to the polls but banked on electors opposed to the far right forming a cordon sanitaire against extremism, keeping Miss Le Pen and Mr Bardella out of high office.
The gamble has failed in spectacular fashion, reminiscent of the UK electorate’s vote to leave the EU after David Cameron, then prime minister, called a referendum that he expected would reject pro-Brexit sentiment and slap down his Eurosceptic Conservative party colleagues.
If France’s lurch to the far right was widely predicted in the run-up to polling, it has nevertheless sent shock waves through the political establishment. Mr Macron’s government has already made a belated concession to public discontent, shelving plans to reduce unemployment benefits.
Voters have turned to RN populism because they are fed up with levels of immigration they regard as out of control, relentless rises in the cost of living and deep-seated feelings of insecurity.
When the French footballer Kylian Mbappe issued a public appeal to voters, especially the young, to resist extremism, Mr Bardella asked why ordinary people should listen to multimillionaires while they struggled to make ends meet.
RN may have sinister roots; Jean-Marie Le Pen’s co-founders of Front National in 1972 included Nazi sympathisers and collaborationists. But the French increasingly see such details as unimportant, treating it in 2024 as a party like any other.
The relatively moderate rule of another figure of Europe’s far right, Giorgia Meloni in Italy, has helped to foster a belief that the French far right can be trusted to suppress extremist tendencies.
With so little time left to muster a rally strong enough to prevent it forming an absolute majority in parliament, many opponents are already burying their own differences. In a flurry of horse-trading, candidates who came in third place on Sunday are being urged to stand down in the hope that voters will then switch to non-RN contenders with better chances of winning.
But the appeal of tactical voting is far from universal. While Mr Macron and his prime minister Gabriel Attal are calling for a realignment of “democratic and republican” forces, the response on the ground varies.
The far left leader Jean-Luc Melenchon, whose France Unbowed party is the biggest component of the New Popular Front alliance of green and socialist candidates, champions the idea of third-placed candidates standing aside if that is the only way to block a RN victory.
But a previous premier under Mr Macron, Edouard Philippe, says he will not support a candidate from either the far left or the far right. Francis Dubois, the conservative Republican candidate and outgoing MP in a south-western Correze constituency, insists he will still stand despite coming third behind the former socialist president Francois Hollande and the RN’s Maitey Pouget.
France’s international reputation will undoubtedly take a battering if the RN wins an absolute majority on Sunday. There will be concerns in Brussels about the party’s chronic Euroscepticism; despite dropping Frexit and leaving the euro currency bloc as political objectives, the RN’s aim of changing the EU from within suggests that bitter conflict lies ahead. Previously friendly relations with the Russian President Vladimir Putin have cooled but Ukraine has cause to worry that a Bardella-led government will feel less enthusiastic about supporting its war effort.
Some mischievous observers have suggested that RN victory may prove a blessing in disguise for conventional parties if the party makes such a mess of governance that the electorate quickly sees the error of its ways.
But that now seems a fanciful response. Political turmoil was the last thing France needed as it prepares to host the Olympic Games from July 26.
Marine Le Pen’s belief that her time has come is understandable. “The Macronist bloc has been practically wiped out,” she said amid gleeful celebrations by supporters on Sunday night. “The French have shown their desire to turn the page.”
Whatever the outcome on Sunday, the next chapter is already taking shape. Building on her party’s remarkable ascendance, Miss Le Pen will now start planning to replace Mr Macron as president when his second and final term ends in 2027.
