By Michel Rose and Sudip Kar-Gupta
PARIS/MARSEILLE, March 22 (Reuters) – France’s far-right National Rally (RN) fell short of taking control of the southern cities of Marseille and Toulon, exit polls showed on Sunday, in municipal elections that gave hope to embattled mainstream parties.
In the second-biggest city Marseille, the incumbent, Socialist Mayor Benoit Payan, was re-elected with 56.3% of the votes, according to an Elabe poll for BFM TV. Other polls also showed him winning.
In Toulon, centre-right candidate Josée Massi led with 53.5%, ahead of the RN with 46.5%, according to an Elabe poll for BFM TV. RN candidate Laure Lavalette conceded defeat.
However, also in the south, Eric Ciotti, a former mainstream conservative who is now an ally of the RN, won in Nice, France’s fifth-biggest city, exit polls showed.
Exit polls in other cities, including Paris, are expected later. Official results will trickle in through the evening.
The thousands of separate municipal ballots are often focused on very local issues and their outcome does not forecast who will win in the April 2027 presidential election to succeed Emmanuel Macron.
But they show trends in popularity and in the type of alliances that can be struck in an increasingly fragmented political landscape.
Senior RN lawmaker Jean-Philippe Tanguy rejected suggestions that the party’s defeat in Toulon showed it had hit a “glass ceiling”, saying it had won dozens of local constituencies where it previously had no presence.
The RN’s chances of winning the biggest prize it covets – Marseille – had taken a hit when hard-left candidate Sebastien Delogu of France Unbowed (LFI) withdrew from the second round out of concern that splitting the left’s vote could help the RN.
Elsewhere, former Prime Minister Edouard Philippe was re-elected mayor in his northern city of Le Havre, according to TF1 and LCI broadcasters, delivering a better-than-expected performance that boosts his hopes of running for president in 2027.
Philippe, a centre-right politician who served as prime minister under the centrist Macron, made a speech with a clear national message, saying his victory showed “there were reasons to be hopeful” in the values of France and that the extremes can be beaten.
LFI looked set to win in Roubaix, a city of nearly 100,000 in northern France, an Ifop-Fiducial poll for TF1, LCI and Sud Radio showed, in good news for a party that had so far not focused much on local elections.
“Traditional parties are losing ground,” Manuel Bompard, of LFI, said.
Senior politicians on the right said the municipal elections showed the mainstream right needed to be united to win – especially in next year’s presidential election.
(Additional reporting by Juliette Jabkhiro in Marseille, Michel Rose, Gianluca Lo Nostro, Inti Landauro, Elizabeth Pineau, Gus Trompiz and John Irish in Paris; Writing by Ingrid Melander; Editing by Michel Rose, Mark Porter, Peter Graff)
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