Hard-right parties have made major gains in European Parliament elections. The success of hard-right parties has added uncertainty to Europe’s future political trajectory.
The four-day election ended on Sunday. Voters from 21 countries of the European Union cast their votes in the elections. The number of voters is 35 crores.
In France, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party dominated the polls to such an extent that Macron immediately dissolved parliament and called for new elections.
In this parliament of 720 seats, the moderate, liberal and socialist parties are going to retain the majority. But especially for the leaders of France, Germany, Austria, the result of this election has come as a big shock.
In France, the National Rally founded by far-right Marine Le Pen is going to get about 33 percent of the vote. President Emmanuel Macron’s Renaissance Party is going to get 15 percent of the vote. After seeing this result, Makhon announced early national elections. He declared the country’s parliament dissolved. The move is seen as a major political risk for Macron.
Like Machon, the election has been bad news for German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. His Social Democratic Party did the worst in the elections. The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) took second place.
In Austria, the far-right Freedom Party received about 26 percent of the vote. On the other hand, the ruling conservative People’s Party got 24.7 percent of the votes.
However, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy did well.
Analysts see the rise of the right wing in the European Parliament elections as a cause for concern.
The European Parliament is said to be the mirror of European nationhood around the world. Individuals from any party cannot directly contest European Parliament elections. There is only team-based competition. Each party participating in the elections draws up a list of potential members of the European Parliament. Any party gets parliamentary membership according to the proportion of votes they get.
The quota of members of the European Parliament is determined according to the ratio of the population of the countries. As such, the highest number of seats is 96 in proportion to the population of 83.8 million inhabitants of Germany. Members of the European Parliament are always elected for five-year terms.