Macron during the campaign’s final stage./Photo: En Marche
Eduardo González. 09/05/2017
As expected, the victory of the social liberal Emmanuel Macron over the far-right candidate Marine Le Pen in the French presidential election has been received with “immense satisfaction” by the Foreign Minister, Alfonso Dastis, who announced that the president of the Government, Mariano Rajoy, has offered to collaborate with the new French leader “as of now” to strengthen the European project.
“We are very happy, very satisfied”, Dastis told the press yesterday before attending a breakfast briefing of the Cervantes Institute’s director, Juan Manuel Bonet, organized by New Economy Forum.
“I think this is great news for France and also for Europe, and, therefore, for Spain”, the minister continued. “The new French President has a view of Europe whose essence corresponds to that of the Spanish Government”, he pointed out.
Nevertheless, Dastis remembered that “many people have voted, unquestionably, for Marine Le Pen” and, therefore, and in order to palliate the rise of this type of movements, “it is our responsibility to bring Europe closer to the citizens and to respond to their expectations as regards security, unemployment, economic growth and the overcoming of inequalities”.
“In that sense, the president of the Government has sent a telegram to the new president of the Republic to work together, as of now, to strengthen and relaunch the European Union”, the minister declared during the subsequent breakfast briefing.
During the breakfast briefing, Juan Manuel Bonet (born in France, of French mother and former director of the Cervantes Institute in Paris) also expressed his “relief” after Macron’s victory, admitting that “it does not correspond to the Cervantes Institute to get involved in politics”. “If I ever felt nostalgia it was yesterday, since I would have liked being in the streets of Paris sharing the relief of the French people”, he admitted.
The social liberal candidate was voted by 87.6% of the French resident in Spain, whereas Le Pen was voted by 12.3%
Emmanuel Macron won yesterday with 66% of the votes, whereas Le Pen had to be content with 33.9%. Among the French resident abroad, just like it happened in the first round, the vote was much more favourable to Macron, who has received 89% of the votes of all the expatriates, whereas the far-right candidate has only been voted by 10.7% of them.
In Spain, results are very similar to the rest of the French of the diaspora, since the social liberal candidate has obtained almost 24,000 votes, which is 87.6% of the about 27,000 valid ballot papers cast (in the first round, he obtained about 10,000 votes, 37%). Le Pen has only obtained 3,373 ballot papers in Spain, which is 12.3%. In the first round, she obtained 2,245 votes (8.3%). Participation in Spain has reached 40%.
