Olivier Faure was confirmed Sunday winner of the vote of the members to designate the first secretary of the Socialist Party, at the end of a commission of verification, but his competitor, Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol, still disputes the result, learned AFP learned from both parties.
According to the verification commission, Olivier Faure, outgoing first secretary, won with 51.09% of the vote against 48.91% for Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol, said a press release from the PS. But Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol asks to resume the work of the commission, which “was interrupted” and could not be finished, and accuses his rival of a “forced passage”.
Just over 500 votes difference
The two men have been arguing since Thursday evening about the results of the members’ vote, each claiming to have won the election. According to the PS press release, the vote verification committee, made up of representatives of the various policy texts, and meeting at the Socialist Party headquarters since Friday “closed its work today (Sunday) at 3:45 p.m. following the refusal to pass to the vote of the representatives of Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol”.
️ Press release
Result of the commission for tallying the votes of the Socialist Party: @faureolivier confirmed winner#PSCongresshttps://t.co/zW1IAG4ByC
— Socialist Party (@partisocialiste) January 22, 2023
“After examining the minutes of the federations and studying the requests for irregularity, and while the disputed votes have been reserved”, the press release indicates that Olivier Faure comes first with 12,020 votes (51.09%), against 11,507 votes for Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol (48.91%), for a total of 23,527 votes cast.
“This is unacceptable”
In another press release, those close to Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol affirm that “the outgoing leadership of our party supported by the representatives of Olivier Faure” proposed, after 15 hours of meeting, “to stop this systematic study and until ‘at the end of the results brought together by the federations and the disputes, in exchange for a global haggling of a result arbitrarily giving the majority to Olivier Faure’.
“It is unacceptable. No democratic party can accept it”, adds the camp of the mayor of Rouen, who asks to “resume the work of our commission tomorrow (Monday) with the elements requested (minutes of sections, lists of signatures etc.) to continue”. “We call to reason those who imagine that a forced passage solution is possible,” they add.