French President Emmanuel Macron (Xinhua file photo)
PARIS, May 7 (Xinhua) -- A year in office, French President Emmanuel Macron celebrated his first anniversary with mixed note that is likely to mount pressure on the leader to further roll his sleeves up to earn back the love of undecided and discontent voters, said Erwan Lestrohan, an analyst at BVA opinion institute.
"It is difficult to make a judgment on Macron's first year. It appears today that he is at half success, half failure, depending on how we analyze the results," Lestrohan told Xinhua in a recent interview.
"It's a complicated period for him because some of his measures have come into effect but they are perceived negative such as the rise of the CSG, the reform of the ISF while other reforms that could potentially be more popular as those targeting the purchasing power are not yet implemented," he added.
Two out of ten French voters approved the president'action while 41 percent of them said they were waiting for the results of his economic roadmap to make up their minds, Lestrohan noted.
"We will be able to confirm if Macron's presidency is a failure or a success when we'll know the final opinion of this slice of the French whose appreciation depends to the outcome of the president's policy. For the moment, we can say that it is mixed assessment pending on result," he said.
In 2017 presidential race marked more by fatigue with the country's political mainstrem, French ex-investment banker emerged as winner on May 7 last year, scoring high voting which has made for the first time an anti-establishment party a part of the country's political landscape which is traditionally dominated by the right and left wings.
Upon his inauguration a year ago, Macron pledged that his first mission would be uniting the French people, facing all challenges and getting the country out of crisis.
Since then, he had been changing labor code and pension, proposing to inject dynamism into public services and institutions and reforming rail sector and education system, the areas in which he was facing fierce opposition that drew thousands to the country's streets in addition to rolling strikes.
According to the BVA analyst, this tense social climate could turn the tide against the 40-year-old president if his package of measures fell short of the French expectation.
"The French main concerns are employment and purchasing power, we can imagine if we have positive results on these two issues, Macron will put the French in a certain dynamism and in turn could appease the social strain and notably prevent convergence of protests," said the French expert.
He added "Macron's real challenge is to show that the policy put in place will provide benefits in terms of employment and purchasing power as a large majority of the population said to judge him only on these topic."
A BVA poll released last week found that although people mostly approve the details of Macron's reform measures, eight out of ten respondents see his economic actions as having no positive impact on their lives.
In a bid to reverse the negative trend, "French president should act more to create a consensus by explaining that the due reforms and that already implemented would not be fruitless," Lestrohan told Xinhua.
Dogged by critics, France's youngest top official in its modern history, decided last month to hit the airwaves to defend ruling style, a political craftiness that seemed helping Macron to have again the wind on his sails, Lestrohan noted.
After the two TV appearances on April 12-15, the president saw his approval ratings up by three percentage points to 43 percent, the pollster's figures showed.
"There was a certain gain in popularity among the targeted population which shows that there was a need for information and pedagogy that had been satisfied," he added.
Meanwhile, Macron had to restore the image of the president of all the French, another tough test for him with only less than third of people think he is close to the population, the analyst noted.
