Don't be surprised if Le Pen wins on May 7

Marine Le Pen (Photo: CNBC)

Today, it's a week since the first round of French elections took place. Very much like what the opinion polls predicted, centrist Emmanuel Macron and far-right Marine Le Pen came on top.

Today, it's one week to go for the second and final round. After many years, we have a very tightly contested race for the next occupant of Palais de l'Élysée (Elysee Palace), the official residence of the President of France.

It's widely speculated that Macron will defeat Le Pen. But as the poll date nears, there are increasing indications that it will not be a cake walk for him. An Odoxa survey, a few days ago showed that the gap between the two had narrowed, and Macron's share of vote could be 59%, down four points. Marine Le Pen stands at 41%, up four points from earlier in the week.

Another poll by Harris Interactive, said that Macron will win: 61% to 39%. But he has lost ground in the past week to Le Pen: six percentage points.

Why the going might be difficult for Macron

On May 23rd, Le Pen got just 5% votes in Paris, but in five adjoining regions -- Grand Est, Hauts-de-France, Normandie, Centre-Val de Loire and Bourgogne-Franche-Comté -- she was the winner.

Emmanuel Macron (Photo: New Statesman)

There is a lot of support for far right views among the youth. The flood of immigrants and the changes that is bringing about in the society isn't to everyone's liking. Extreme right is seeking exit of not just refugees but even people of non-European and sometimes even non-French origin. Le Pen's FN party is no longer extreme right-wing, but many who are right and beyond are likely to back Le Pen rather than Macron.

She has support from not just youth of 18 to 24 years, but also among the working class and lower middle class. And these are not demographic bands that get widely represented in urban media. A good example of this was when she engineered a publicity coup by meeting striking workers of the Whirlpool factory at the picket gate of their factory in Amiens, while Macron was holding talks with union officials in the comforts of the building. The factory is facing closure after a number of jobs were outsourced to Poland. She said she will not let the factory close.

There is massive unemployment. It's around 10%. While it is 4% in Germany, and 5% in the UK. And this has been agitating the youth. In Round 1 on April 23, she won in areas that had high unemployment and low wages.

Similarity to Trump

There is an unmistakable similarity to what played out in the US in the runup to the November poll in the US. Everyone predicted Hillary will win, but Trump kept gaining steadily in opinion polls, which the media largely didn't take seriously. Le Pen too is gaining steadily.

Trump appealed to a vast number of blue-collar workers. So is Le Pen. And that is a good number in France too.

Many people think Macron will be indecisive in these times when tough decisions would have to be taken. They think he would just be another of those business-class elite would just go with the not-too-well-working system.

And now we have reports that Russian hackers have broken into Macron's campaign, much like what we heard about the Democratic campaign in the US.

The quiet voters

What might prove crucial is how supporters of left and far-left would vote. Its leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon who secured 19% votes last week, hasn't endorsed Macron. May 7 result will be affected if many his supporters decide to support Le Pen or even abstain, without voting for either.

Macron may have won Round 1, and all parties (except the Socialists) might be uniting behind him to prevent FN from coming to power. But does that imply that people too would unite similarly?

In other words, many voters who might theoretically be against Le Pen could support her. But since that's going to be "very politically incorrect" for them, they might not talk about it.

How ironic it would be, if most of Left abstains, and that catapults Marine Le Pen to Palais de l'Élysée.

References:

All the ways Emmanuel Macron could still lose the French election - Quartz, April 28, 2017

Le Pen GAINS ground as Macron support drops ahead of final vote -  Sunday Express,  Apr 28, 2017

Marine Le Pen closes the gap with Emmanuel Macron - Daily Mail, April 28, 2017

Macron heckled by pro-Le Pen workers - BBC, 26 April 2017

'Death of the French left': why voters are hesitating over Macron - The Guardian, 26 April 2017

Russian hackers 'target' presidential candidate Macron - BBC, 25 April 2017

Marine Le Pen wins just 5% of Paris vote while rural FN support surges - Independent, April 24, 2017

How the Election Split France - New York Times, April 23, 2017

'The real misery is in the countryside': support for Le Pen surges in rural France - The Guardian, April 21, 2017

Why does Le Pen get so much support from young voters? - Al Jazeera, April 20, 2017

Marine Le Pen’s surprise supporters - Politico, Jan 23, 2017

France unemployment rate - Countryeconomy.com

What can Arvind Kejriwal do to stop his and AAP's downslide

Yesterday, right from day break, all major news channels were showing results of the Delhi municipal corporation elections. Anyone could be pardoned for mistaking it be the results of national elections or something of such magnitude!

Source: News18/PTI

Focus was a shade greater on the loser (Aam Aadmi Party and its national convener Arvind Kejriwal) than on the winner (Bharatiya Janata Party). For BJP, this is the third consecutive victory. So it wasn't a big deal, in a sense. Imagine if AAP, the ruling party in Delhi Assembly, was able to win. That surely was the aim of Kejriwal. But that was not to be.

After the glorious victory in the Delhi Assembly elections in 2015, AAP contested in assembly elections in Goa and Punjab this year. They lost badly. And now the Delhi municipal corporation. The fact that AAP has been on a losing streak must be giving Kejriwal and its supporters the jitters.

Noble objectives

In 2012, when Kejriwal broke ranks with his mentor Anna Hazare, and joined politics to fight the system from within, he gained a lot of appreciation. That was most evident in the manner in which AAP emerged on top in the Delhi Assembly elections just one year later.

It was the single largest party with 28 seats in the House of 70. Kejriwal formed a minority government with Congress support. Then over the issue of passing the Jan Lok Pal Bill, for which he didn't get support from any major political party, he resigned after being in power for just 49 days.

Elections were held again in 2015; and this time, the people gave him a very clear mandate. AAP won 67 seats, the BJP the rest and Congress was wiped out.

Blinding glare of victory

In retrospect, the massive victory, ironically, proved to be the Achilles heel. Kejriwal misunderstood the verdict to be a green signal to carry on his fight against the system. But actually, what people wanted him to do was to start fixing the broken system.

Unfortunately, Kejriwal, probably, blinded by the glare of victory, just got carried away, as if by inertia, and couldn't simply give up his confrontational approach. He didn't realise that the ease of campaigning had turned into hard grind of governance. He took on the system from within. The system proved to be too gigantic and the problems too hard for him to handle or fix.

One major issue for him was the constitutional structure of the Delhi's administration, which gives a role to the Union government as well, since the city is also the capital of the country. In fact, Delhi isn't a full fledged state and is officially called National Capital Territory of Delhi.

Kejriwal kept fighting with the Lt Governor and attacked the Prime Minister relentlessly. Though he had said he won't contest Lok Sabha elections in 2014, he changed mind, and fought against Modi in Varanasi and lost by over 3 lakh votes. AAP, effectively a regional party in Delhi, contested 432 seats nationwide for the Lok Sabha and won just four. But, the resounding victory he still managed a year later in Delhi assembly elections was a clear message from the people for him to stick to Delhi first.

But, Kejriwal forgot that he was the chief minister of a Union territory. He should have focused on fixing what is wrong in Delhi with the powers he and his party have. Instead he wanted greater powers; and worse, he didn't abandon his confrontational approach. An administrator or a manager can't make much headway if he or she is constantly whining and taking on everyone with whom he or she has work with.

What can he do

The mark of an administrator with the finesse of getting things done, is his ability to move forward through available channels rather get bogged down before obstacles. One rule of thumb often quoted is, when you have ten issues to solve, and you get stuck with three, move ahead with the seven and come back to the three later. But Kejriwal chose to get stuck with the three. And probably he is still paying the price for that.

Kejriwal is meeting his team to discuss what went wrong and how the party can connect back with the people. My few suggestions for him would be:

• Stop complaining and finding fault with everyone and everything around you
• Realise that as a chief minister, you are also an enabler and not an obstructor
• Focus on Delhi and turn it into a model union territory
• Use the powers you have effectively before craving for more
• Good to aim high, but not if nothing much gets done
• Better to lower the aim, get things done; and then raise the level
• Show you can work effectively even with people whom you don't like and still deliver results

It is still not late for Kejriwal and Aam Aadmi Party, to realise many, if not all the goals it had set for itself when it entered the political arena.

You may also like to read:

• AAP landslide victory: random thoughts
• A political rally with a difference

Young lady at the ticket counter

I was now reading an article about currency shortage and the problem of "small change" like one, two or three rupees. And, a small personal anecdote came to my mind.

I was at a Metro Rail station. Since I had forgotten my prepaid smart card at home, I had to purchase a token. At the booking counter, the official asked me if I had a change of Rs 2.

But I had only a coin of Rs 5, and he didn't have Rs 3 to give me in return.

There was a brief interlude.

Noticing that there were others waiting in the queue, and not wanting to prolong the agony, I told the official, "It's ok. I will give you Rs 5 and you can keep the change of Rs 3."

He looked surprised; but seemed to agree to the deal.

Just then,  a young lady, standing next to me in the queue, moved forward, took out her wallet, and said, "I have a Rs 2 coin. You can give this. ... "

It took a moment for me to realise what was happening. And I said, "O no, it's fine. It's just three rupees. It comes and goes". Only the other day the vegetable vendor had waived Rs 3 I owed him.

Pushing the Rs 2 coin forward, she said, "Precisely. Two rupees also comes and goes. That's ok. I have been in such situations before."

She in fact pushed that Rs 2 coin through the opening on the ticket counter window. Probably assuming that she and I were known to each other, the ticketing official took that Rs 2 coin. He gave me the token, and turned his attention to that lady.

In the meantime, I thanked that unknown young woman. It also left me a wondering why did she do that, though it was all about just Rs 2. Maybe someone had earlier similarly helped her with change; and she just wanted to keep that chain going.

While she was getting her smart card recharged, I told her. "Thank you, for your kindness," and I headed to the platform to take the Metro. I didn't see her after that.