French Greens pick Jadot as presidential candidate amid fragmented Left

The French Greens lack the firepower of their German counterparts and no opinion poll sees Jadot as a serious challenger to President Emmanuel Macron. But the question is whether the self-styled consensus builder, who wants to attract voters beyond the remits of the small Greens party, could emerge as a leader of the fragmented French Left - for that election and beyond - and weigh on the political debate.

Green voters on Tuesday chose former Greenpeace activist Yannick Jadot to be their candidate for France's April 2022 presidential election.

Jadot won the vote by a narrow margin, winning 51.03% of the votes against 48.97% for the self-styled radical Sandrine Rousseau. The 54-year old EU lawmaker wants France to devote 20 billion euros ($23.43 billion) per year to the transition to a more environment-friendly economy, progressively end intensive animal farming and establish a new wealth tax.

Born in a village in northern France, Jadot worked a few years for NGOs in Burkina Faso and Bangladesh before getting increasingly involed in politics back home while heading several environment-focused NGOs, including the French branch of Greenpeace. The French Greens lack the firepower of their German counterparts and no opinion poll sees Jadot as a serious challenger to President Emmanuel Macron.

But the question is whether the self-styled consensus builder, who wants to attract voters beyond the remits of the small Greens party, could emerge as a leader of the fragmented French Left - for that election and beyond - and weigh on the political debate.