<div style="text-align: justify; "><span style="font-size: 1rem;"><b>France's far-right National Rally (RN) has confirmed 27-year-old Jordan Bardella as the replacement as party leader for Marine Le Pen.</b></span><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">Ms Le Pen will focus instead on leading the party's group in parliament, after it took 89 seats in the National Assembly earlier this year.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It marks the first time in its 50-year history that the main far-right party has not been led by a Le Pen.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But the move does not mark a major change in direction for the party.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Marine Le Pen remains the source of real power and she is still the likely candidate in the next presidential election in 2027.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">She told the party on Saturday that she was not disappearing from politics.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"I am not leaving RN to take a holiday. I will be there where the country needs me," she said at the party convention.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Addressing the party, Mr Bardella said he sought to unite all those who want to put France back on the right track.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"With us, the people of France will always have priority at home and we do not intend to give up on serving our people first," he said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"We will finally be the friends and the road to recovery that the country needs to ward off 40 years of mistakes, of letting go, of resignation and cowardice."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Brought up in a poor family of Italian origin in the Paris suburbs, Mr Bardella joined the far-right as a teenager and rose quickly to the top of the party, becoming its acting president last year.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">He ran the RN's successful 2019 European election campaign, and has since impressed even his enemies with his assertiveness in debates.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">He is seen as loyal to Ms Le Pen, telling AFP news agency recently that he is a "continuity candidate with the aim of building on the incredible legacy that Marine is handing over".</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">His elevation to the party's senior leadership is part of the RN's efforts to soften its image and attract younger voters.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Like Ms Le Pen he likes to portray himself as a new type of nationalist who has little in common with the racism and anti-Semitism of the party's predecessor, the National Front.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">However, critics say that these sentiments still exist within the party.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In the most recent controversy, a RN lawmaker was suspended for two weeks from the National Assembly for making an allegedly racist remark while a black member of parliament was speaking.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Ms Le Pen stepped down last year as leader of the party, which she had headed since she succeeded her father Jean-Marie Le Pen in 2011. She did so in order to focus on her presidential bid, which she eventually lost in April in a run-off to President Emmanuel Macron.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Despite the defeat, she fronted the party's parliamentary election campaign two months later in which the RN won 89 seats - a 10-fold rise and the party's best-ever showing.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The success of the far-right and the left in those elections led to President Macron's party losing its majority. BBC</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd24/kh</div>