Le Pen seeks to regain momentum after poll setback

PARIS: French far right leader Marine Le Pen this weekend hosts a party congress seeking to find new impetus for her 2022 challenge to President Emmanuel Macron after disappointing results in regional elections.

Last month’s vote saw Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) fail in its bid to gain control of at least one of the 13 regions of mainland France for the first time, after initial polls had indicated it could pick several up.

While the regional elections are very different to next year’s presidential race, the failure raised questions about the strategy of Le Pen, who over the last years has sought to rebrand her party as a more mainstream right wing force.

It was little consolation for her that Macron’s ruling centrist Republic on the Move (LREM) party fared even worse, with the traditional right showing signs of a resurgence.

Most analysts have expected the 2022 presidential race to come down to a duel between Macron and Le Pen -- in a repeat of the 2017 scenario -- but this is no longer seen as a forgone conclusion.

The two-day congress on Saturday and Sunday is being held in Perpignan in the south of France, the largest city to be controlled by the RN, under mayor Louis Aliot.

"We must ask ourselves why our voters did not turn out. There is a general context. But we have our share of responsibility. We have to analyse things well and respond to them in an effective way," Aliot told Sud Radio. Le Pen is due to deliver her keynote address to the congress at 1300 GMT on Sunday. The party is increasingly riven by tensions over how far it should push what insiders call a process of "de-demonisation" by toning down once strident rhetoric against immigration and the EU.

Le Pen was widely regarded as under-performing in the 2017 campaign and there have even been whispers that another figure, such as controversial TV pundit Eric Zemmour, could present a rival far-right candidacy from outside the party.