French voters will elect new members of Parliament on 30 June and 7 July.
Two weeks ago, French President Emmanuel Macron had suddenly announced the dissolution of the Parliament and mid-term elections.
President Macron had announced the parliamentary elections at a time when the hard-right National Rally Party had achieved great success in the European Parliament elections.
While announcing the elections, Macron had appealed to the citizens of his country not to ‘pay attention to the fundamentalists’. However, all the opinion polls are indicating that the National Rally will emerge as the largest party in the country’s Parliament after these elections. What is the meaning of general elections in France and when will they be held?
In these elections, 577 members of the National Assembly, the lower house of the French Parliament, will be elected. It is this House that makes the laws of the country.
The members of the upper house of the Parliament, i.e. the Senate, are elected jointly by the National Assembly and local authorities.
On June 30, voting will be held in all 577 parliamentary constituencies on the French mainland and in populated areas and departments away from France.
French citizens living abroad can also vote in these elections. One Member of Parliament is elected from each district.
Re-voting will be held on all seats on July 7, in which voters will have to choose between the two candidates who received the most votes in the first round.
Candidates who get more than 12.5 percent votes in the first round can contest the next round of elections.
In such a situation, generally in the second round of voting there is a contest between two or three candidates on each seat.
To have majority in Parliament, a party or alliance has to win 289 seats.
