President Emmanuel Macron loses absolute majority in French parliamentary elections

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Emmanuel Macron, the French president, lost his absolute parliamentary majority on Sunday in a stinging blow that portends a difficult second term in office.

The poor results mean that Mr Macron will struggle to advance his ambitious national agenda, which includes an overhaul of the French pension system.

Mr Macron’s centrist Ensemble (Together) alliance won 245 seats in the lower parliament. This is enough to keep an overall majority but still short of the 289 seats it needed to keep the absolute majority in the 577-seat National Assembly.