French voters wait for hours to cast presidential ballot in Montreal

In Canada many comments appeared on social media about the length of the queue and the time it took to vote in Montreal for the first round of the French presidential election. There were complaints that only one polling station was available, even though some 57,000 people were eligible to vote in the largely French-speaking city. Officials were reportedly expecting around 30,000 actually to do so, in which case it looked like they had seriously underestimated. Videos and photos showed a long queue stretching for several blocks on Saturday. But many persevered – posting afterwards that they had managed to cast their ballots despite a wait of several hours. French overseas territories and the country’s nationals abroad cast their ballots on Saturday, a day ahead of the presidential election in mainland France. French people voting for the french election in #montreal Looks like they underestimated the number of voters… https://t.co/nu5oXYZXoN— Orph30 (@Orph30) April 22, 2017 The voting lines are huge! We’ve been here for 1.5 hours #mtl #frenchelection #france #montreal  pic.twitter.com/U7Tz1KEiYM— Zoé (@zoezeitgeist) April 22, 2017 Voting abroad is today. The French ppl I know have told me the wait time has been 3+ hours at the one polling station in Montreal.— David Rankin (@davidrankin) April 22, 2017 There were thousands lined up, covering over 5 blocks in Montreal’s #Presidentielle2017 first round voting. It took 2 hours, but I voted! https://t.co/8SVvwUnE2P— E. Richard Gold (@IP_policy) April 22, 2017