Francois Fillon, is the very clear winner Sunday of the primary of the right ahead of Alain Juppé, and will defend the colours of his camp in the presidential election of 2017, with a good chance of winning given the disunity of the left.
Announced just before 8.30pm, “In 2121 offices, the respective scores were for Francois Fillon 69.5% of the vote and Alain Juppé 30.5% of the vote”, said Anne Levade, the president of the high authority, which will update the results throughout the evening.
Screams of joy, accompanied the announcement of the first results to HQ of Francois Fillon, who then made a double exploit: easily winning the first round (44.2%), he successively rejected the two favorites in the polls Alain Juppe and Nicolas Sarkozy which he was Prime Minister for five years (2007-2012), dryly eliminated last Sunday.
It should take in the evening speech from his headquarters, probably after the mayor of Bordeaux, clearly beaten after racing ahead in the polls for two years.
More voters
For the second round, voters were still made a little more in the 10,228 polling stations that a week ago. According to the chairman of the organizing committee, Thierry Solère (LR), participation was up 4.5% at 5pm, almost three million voters, about 120,000 voters and more on figures for 78 % of polling stations.
This second round thus set a record for an open primary held in France. In 2011, 2.9 million voters participated in the primary initiated by the SP, which retry the exercise on 22 and 29 January.
Fillon is expected to be invested in the coming weeks by his party. It will also draw the future contours of his leadership prerogative falling to the winner of the primary as LR statutes.
From the indentation Nicolas Sarkozy, eliminated from the first round, chaired by Acting Laurent Wauquiez.
In a strong position to face the left
Fillon also said he intended to quickly unveil the list of Ministers of his future government in case of victory in 2017.
Discussions with centrist formations should also be included in the program for the parliamentary elections. With unknown as the strategy adopted by François Bayrou, who did not rule compete in the Elysee Palace in defeat his champion Alain Juppe.
With a leftist government in tatters, Mr Fillon is in a strong position for the 2017 presidential election (April 23 and May 7). It will be for this reason one of the main opponents will be Marine Le Pen of the National Front.
Other candidates should however emerge to right, starting with Nicolas Dupont-Aignan (DLF). Michele Alliot-Marie also maintains suspense on a possible candidacy. Members Henri Guaino (LR) and Jean Lassalle (ex-MoDem) announced they would try to gather the necessary 500 sponsorships.
Hostilities for the presidential launched
The epilogue of this primary should definitely start hostilities for the presidential election. On the left, all eyes are turned to Francois Hollande. The head of state should indeed announce soon whether or not he is running for a second term in an electric atmosphere with his Prime Minister Manuel Valls.
In an interview with Sunday newspaper, Mr Valls does not exclude a candidate to face President of primary PS, explaining to want to “break this mechanism would lead (left) in defeat” , as mentioned Saturday, Assembly President Claude Bartolone, at odds with the head of state.
No president under the Fifth Republic, has renounced a second term, except Georges Pompidou died in office in 1974.
