Polling day in France's départements

Polling stations are open today for the first round of voting in the departmental elections.  New rules apply.

Voting in France is a tortuous business.  Country-wide there are almost 20 political parties or party (or unaffiliated) groupings, four of which are fielding candidates for the canton of Carentan.  Candidates now have to present themselves as "binôme", i e a pairing of a male and a female candidate who are not strictly required to owe allegiance to the same political party or grouping, or for that matter any party at all (in which case they are categorised as "various").  

Here there are four pairs of candidates standing for election.  The clue to their tendencies is by the background colours in different shades of red and blue.   The bill board is provided by the local council, and each binôme is allocated its own number.

From left to right are:
1  Front de Gauche - a leftist coalition - with the enticing motto of "The future starts here"
2  an unaffiliated grouping of right-leaning local candidates under the motto "New Manche, New Energies" - Manche being the name of the département, a unit roughly similar to the UK county
3  Rassemblement Bleu Marine - a far right coalition - the "bleu marine" literally meaning navy blue but also unambiguously referring to the National Front leader MARINE Le Pen
4  another leftist party or grouping of the left, the detail on the photo is insufficient for me to decipher exactly which one.

To complicate matters further, on two of the photos you will see a second binôme, identified as "replacements".  I cannot fathom who exactly replaces whom in what circumstances, but the overall object of the exercise is clearly to ensure an equal number of each sex on each departmental council.

Yes, it's all departmental, certainly experimental  .... and definitely mental!  A final thought: will the next elections for the French presidency also be based on a binôme??