Popular Republican Union (2007)

Popular Republican Union
Union Populaire Républicaine
President François Asselineau
Founded 25 March 2007
Headquarters 60, avenue de la République 75011 PARIS
Membership  (2014) 2960
Ideology Euroscepticism, souverainism, Gaullism
Political position Syncretic
National Assembly
0 / 577
Senate
0 / 348
European Parliament
0 / 74
Regional Councils
0 / 1,880
Website
www.upr.fr
Politics of France
Political parties
Elections

Popular Republican Union (French: Union Populaire Républicaine), is a French political party.

It was founded in 2007 by François Asselineau who still presides it. The ideology of the party is to regain the sovereignty of France by the withdrawal from the European Union, the euro and the NATO.

History

After leaving the Rally for an Independent and Sovereign France (RIF)[1] where François Asselineau was a member of the steering committee for 3 months, on March 25, 2007, for the 50th anniversary of the Rome Treaty signature,[2] he created the Popular Republican Union (UPR).[3][4]

Ideology

UPR runs on a neither right nor left,[5][6] anti-EU platform stating that all French policy decisions are made by an "unelected oligarchy, not French," leading to the political disaffection of the French public, and that the continued rule of the EU over European affairs will lead to a "global apartheid".[7] UPR promotes that withdrawal from the European Union and the euro by the usage of TEU Article 50[8] as a first step to get France out of its current crisis by regaining capital, goods and person flow regulation control.[6][7] For military sovereignty, UPR advocates France withdrawal from the NATO.[9]

UPR is also inspired by the National Council of the Resistance thus favors nationalisation such as TF1, La Poste, Gaz de France, highways, water management and troubled banks.[5][7]

UPR program refers to the recognition of the blank vote, of the installment of popular referendum and the creation of the national debates about the public debt, immigration and energy that would lead to referendum.[5]

Leadership

UPR is presided by its founder François Asselineau.

Popular support and electoral record

UPR is claiming being a constantly growing party despite "the blacklisting from the national media" due to UPR's program.[5] The movement has been developed primarily online notably because of Asselineau's conferences that had been seen nearly than 2 Million times.[10] They claimed being one of the most visited French political party website according to their Alexa rank.[11]

Date Membership Source
29 May 2013 2960 [12]
29 February 2012 ≈1000 [7]

Presidential

In January 2011, François Asselineau announced his intention to run for the 2012 French presidential election for the UPR.[13] He confirmed his candidacy in December 2011 during the national congress of the party.[14] However, Asselineau was finally not among the ten candidates officially endorsed by the Constitutional council as he could muster only 17[12] out of the 500 signatures from elected politicians that are necessary to run for president.[14]

Legislative

Following the Cahuzac affair and the resignation of Jérôme Cahuzac, François Asselineau and Régis Chamagne decided to run for the legislative election in the Lot-et-Garonne's 3rd constituency. The candidacy was described as being parachuted since neither Asselineau nor Chamagne were from the locality. They advocated that it was not applicable for legislative election since members of the National Assembly are representing the whole nation not a region.[9] UPR's goal to run for this election was to expose their analysis to the locals that the European Union is "a deception"[9] and "the cause of their problem".[15] UPR wanted also to galvanize party's members and to gain in notoriety thanks to the media exposure of this election.[15] UPR failed to reach the second round with a score of 0.58%.[16]

European Parliament

The party participated in the 2014 European Parliament election by being one of the 15 parties (out of 193) to present lists in every circonscriptions.[17] They had a budget of euros 350,000 that allowed them to supply UPR's program only to 30 departments' electoral mailing.[18] The purpose was to introduce their program hoping to alert electors deceived from the current political system[19] and gain in notoriety thanks to the media exposure.[11] François Asselineau complained to CSA that the party did not have access to media and claimed that media's principle of equity was to expose parties that are already well-known.[20] Asselineau for UPR scored 0.58% of votes cast in the Île-de-France constituency.[21]

See also

References

  1. ↑ De Boissieu, Laurent. "Rassemblement pour l'indépendance et la souveraineté de la France (RIF)", France-politique.fr, 21 October 2011. Retrieved on 1 October 2013.
  2. ↑ Lopez, Julien and Zebaïr, Yannis. "Asselineau: La dictature de l'Europe", Bondy Blog, 28 October 2011. Retrieved on 1 October 2013.
  3. ↑ "Les souverainistes radicaux créent l’Union populaire républicaine", revue-republicaine, 28 March 2007. Retrieved on 1 October 2013.
  4. ↑ Page of the party on France Politique
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 Moulinier, Ève. "François Asselineau, le candidat qui dit non à l’UE", Le Dauphiné Libéré page 4, 12 February 2012. Retrieved on 1 October 2013
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 "LE NORD - PAS-DE-CALAIS DE A À Z", La Voix du nord, 28 February 2012. Retrieved on 1 October 2013
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 7.3 Dupont, Isabelle. "Un petit candidat contre la grande Europe", Nord éclair, February 29, 2012. Retrieved on 1 October 2013
  8. ↑ De Boissieu, Laurent. "Ces "petits" candidats qui veulent se faire entendre", La croix, March 15, 2012. Retrieved on 1 October 2013
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 Schrepf, Jerôme. "Villeneuve-sur-lot. L'UPR entre conquête et résistance", LaDépêche.fr, May 24, 2013. Retrieved on 1 October 2013
  10. ↑ "Qui est François Asselineau?", Valeurs Actuelles, 3 March 2014. Retrieved on 13 March 2014.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Lemonnier, Jérôme. "Les « petits partis » partent à l’assaut des européennes", Essone Info, 22 May 2014. Retrieved on 24 June 2014.
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 Houchard, Béatrice. "Trois recalés de la présidentielle en repêchage à Villeneuve-sur-Lot", Le Figaro, May 30, 2013. Retrieved on 1 October 2013
  13. ↑ Choq FM (radio québécoise ?), "L'autre monde" (The other world), 14 February 2011
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 Houchard, Béatrice. "Asselineau candidat à la présidentielle", Le Parisien, 3 December 2011. Retrieved on 1 October 2013
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 Olivari, Candice. "Les candidats à l'élection législative partielle en Lot-et-Garonne", France 3, June 10, 2013. Retrieved on 1 October 2013
  16. ↑ "Election législative partielle : les résultats définitifs", Villeneuve-sur-Lot, 23 June 2013. Retrieved on 1 October 2013
  17. ↑ De Boissieu, Laurent. "Elections européennes: les listes qui veulent créer la surprise", La Croix, 21 May 2014. Retrieved on 24 June 2014
  18. ↑ Quinault Maupoil, Tristan. "Européennes: un record de 31 listes à départager en Île-de-France", Le Figaro, 12 May 2014. Retrieved on 24 June 2014
  19. ↑ "Asselineau (UPR) à Ermont", Le Parisien, 21 May 2014. Retrieved on 24 June 2014
  20. ↑ Thompson, Yann. "Européennes : la galère des petits candidats", France TV, 21 May 2014. Retrieved on 24 June 2014.
  21. ↑

External links