France seeks govt as PM vows to guard against extremes

PARIS: France´s political parties scrambled on Friday to break a parliamentary deadlock brought on by an inconclusive snap election, as the outgoing prime minister vowed to prevent any government with far-right or hard-left members.

A runoff on Sunday left the National Assembly without any overall majority, but a broad alliance of Socialists, Communists, Greens and the hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) won the most seats, with 193 in the 577-strong lower chamber.

Voters from different camps joined forces in the runoff to shut the far-right National Rally (RN) out of power in a “republican front”, allowing President Emmanuel Macron´s followers to claim second place with 164 seats and leaving the far right in third at 143.

With each of the three blocs controlling roughly one-third of the chamber, political leaders are admitting it may be a long slog to find a government able to survive a no-confidence vote.

Macron has rejected LFI demands they should be tasked with forming the next government, appearing to rule out a role for either LFI -- the largest player in the New Popular Front (NFP) left alliance -- or the far-right RN in any new coalition.

Prime Minister Gabriel Attal echoed that stance on Friday saying that he would seek “to guard against any government” that included RN or LFI ministers.

In a document outlining his bid to take the leadership of the Macron-allied “Renaissance” parliamentary group, Attal acknowledged it had “narrowly escaped extinction” in the vote.