Sarkozy gears up for another landslide

French President Nicolas Sarkozy's UMP party seems to be heading for a landslide in today's second round of parliamentary elections. Projections based on last Sunday's first round results give the centre-right UMP between 400 and 450 seats out of the 577 seats in parliament, which will no doubt give Mr Sarkozy a huge mandate to press ahead with his sweeping economic reforms.

Today's second round is a run-off between the top two candidates in each district and any other candidate who won at least 12.5 per cent of the vote, but because of this threshold, most contests are a two-horse race. However, those candidates who obtained 50 per cent or more of the vote in the first round were immediately elected, and 109 MPs were elected outright.

Mr Sarkozy has certainly hit a chord with the French electorate and seems to have done everything right so far. For example, his choice of ministers was a huge success. Socialists, centrists, centre-right figures (including potential rivals), seven women (including one of north African origin) were appointed to his government. His choice of a slimmed-down Cabinet of 15 - half the size of the previous Cabinet, also went down well with the electorate.

France has not re-elected the same government to power since 1978 but this time the situation is very different indeed. Mr Sarkozy has managed - despite the unpopularity of the previous centre-right government - to create a new political momentum in the country and to establish a powerful link with the electorate.

The voters have turned to him, and not to the left, to sort out France's social and economic problems and to introduce much needed reforms.

The Socialists, on the other hand, are certainly in a bad state and could get as little as 60 seats in today's election. The entire left - the Socialists and their allies - secured only 40 per cent of the vote last Sunday.

Soon after last week's first round elections, Ségoléne Royal, the defeated Socialist presidential candidate, appealed to Francois Bayrou, the leader of the new centrist Democrat Movement, to back the left in today's run-off election to prevent the UMP from securing a crushing victory.

However, Mr Sarkozy acted before Mr Bayrou could reply to Ms Royal - he ordered the local UMP candidate to stand aside in Mr Bayrou's district and not contest today's election - in what would have been a three-way race - thus guaranteeing the centrist leader's seat in his fight against the Socialist candidate.

Mr Bayrou's Democrat Movement in fact received only 7.6 per cent in last Sunday's first round and has only six candidates in today's run-off election. His failure to back Mr Sarkozy in the second round of the presidential election - which most people consider to be a huge political blunder - convinced the majority of his then UDF MPs to desert him and form a new Centre Party allied to Mr Sarkozy's UMP. Polls suggest these MPs are expected to do better than Mr Bayrou's Democrat Movement today.

The far right has also been severely marginalised with the National Front having only one candidate in today's run-off election, an indication of Mr Sarkozy's ability to neutralise support for this political grouping.

Mr Sarkozy has said he will hold a special session of parliament in July to initiate his first set of political and economic reforms. The French President undoubtedly has a huge mandate to overhaul France and this mandate should be confirmed today, even though the left has seized on recent comments made Prime Minister Francois Fillion that the government intends to increase substantially the Vat rate to help fund the country's costly social costs.

This latest development may cost the UMP some support, but a huge victory is still expected.

A parliamentary majority by itself is not enough to bring about France's much-needed reform, as the 1995-1997 and 2002-2007 legislatures showed, when President Jacques Chirac's UMP was in office.

What is needed is political determination, strong will, clarity of purpose as well as good public relations, which Mr Sarkozy seems to possess. Now the French President must show that he is as good at governing as he is at campaigning.

The fighting between Hamas and Fatah and the Gaza Strip falling under the complete control of Hamas can only make the very difficult situation in the Middle East even worse. The conflict has led Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to declare a state of emergency, fire his government and rule by decree, something that Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniya has rejected.

This conflict has the potential to lead the West Bank and Gaza Strip effectively being cut off from one another - Gaza run by Hamas and the West Bank by Fatah. Worse still, the conflict could develop into an all-out civil war between the Palestinians, turn the Palestinian territories into a failed state, and could make the dream of so many Palestinians to have an independent state die for another generation.

It could also lead to a massive Israeli incursion into the Gaza Strip, especially if Hamas intensify their attacks on Israel.

The wider implications are therefore very clear: the peace process (if such a thing still exists in the Middle East) will be put into the deep freeze, Palestinian society will become more radicalised and Islamic militancy will increase throughout the Muslim world. A failed state will mean more terrorism.

What is needed immediately is a massive diplomatic effort on the part of the Arab world, Europe and the United States to convince Hamas and Fatah to end this madness, agree to a ceasefire and negotiate a settlement.

Europe must also review its policy of trying to isolate Hamas and of imposing sanctions on the Palestinian government because of Hamas's presence - in return, of course, for certain conditions and promises. The problem is whether both Hamas and Fatah really exert control over their armed wings.