France’s Macron back to square one as talks on forming government drag on

French President Emmanuel Macron.(Daniel Cole / POOL / AFP)

• France’s Socialists and Greens will not participate in further talks with President Emmanuel Macron to find a way out of the country’s political deadlock.
• Macron slammed the door on a potential leftist government, saying it would be immediately removed from power by a majority of lawmakers from other camps. 
• A new round of talks with party leaders are scheduled to take place on Tuesday. 

France’s Socialists and Greens will not participate in further talks with President Emmanuel Macron to find a way out of the country’s political deadlock, their leaders said on Tuesday, calling on their supporters to hold peaceful protests instead.

Macron slammed the door on a potential leftist government on Monday, saying it would be immediately removed from power by a majority of lawmakers from other camps, and called another round of marathon talks with party leaders for Tuesday.

But facing a hung parliament in which each of the three almost equal groupings – the left, Macron’s centrist bloc and the far right – have ruled out forming a coalition, the president appeared to be back to square one.

“This election is being stolen from us,” Green party chief Marine Tondelier told local radio.

“We’re not going to continue these sham consultations with a president who doesn’t listen anyway … and is obsessed with keeping control. He’s not looking for a solution, he’s trying to obstruct it,” Tondelier said.

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Socialist party president Olivier Faure told France 2 television he would not engage in what he called a “parody of democracy” now the prospect of a leftist-led government was off the table.

The New Popular Front (NFP), an alliance of parties ranging from the moderate Socialists and Greens to the eurosceptic France Unbowed (LFI) won more votes than any other party in snap parliamentary elections this summer. That led its leaders to assert their claim to form the next government.

Their hopes to govern, however, faded after weeks of infighting and haggling in which political rivals made clear they would oppose any leftist government unless it cut ties with the LFI and its firebrand leader Jean-Luc Melenchon.

Macron, a pro-business centrist, thinks the balance of power lies more with the centre or centre right. But any such alliance would also require driving a wedge through the left to win the backing from its more moderate factions, something leftist leaders have repeatedly ruled out.

“Their problem is not only France Unbowed (LFI), it’s the left,” Faure said. “They can’t accept a vote in which they don’t emerge as the winners.”