PARIS – President Emmanuel Macron today holds his first rally of the French election campaign, with far-right rival Marine Le Pen eating into what once seemed his unassailable lead barely a week ahead of the ballot.
The centrist Macron threw his hat into the election ring at the last moment and has been distracted by the war in Ukraine, conducting diplomacy from the Elysee while Le Pen paces the country to discuss basic issues, including purchasing power.
With the first round of elections on April 10 – followed by a run-off on April 24 – polls have shown Le Pen comfortably in second place in the initial stage and narrowing the gap on Macron for round two.
Macron’s 1230 GMT rally at the indoor La Defense Arena stadium – a vast venue that usually hosts top-level rugby and rock concerts – represents a pivotal chance for the president to regain momentum.
“Of course Marine Le Pen can win,” Macron’s former prime minister Edouard Philippe warned in an interview with the Le Parisien daily posted online Thursday.
Philippe, who is backing Macron, added that “if she wins, believe me, things will be seriously different for the country...her programme is dangerous”.
The latest Elabe poll published Wednesday showed Le Pen winning 47.5% of the vote in a second-round run-off against Macron, who was projected to garner 52.5%, a smaller margin than in the same poll last week.
Le Pen, who lost to Macron in the 2017 polls run-off, has sought to moderate her image in the last half decade in a process helped by the emergence of Eric Zemmour as a fellow candidate in the far-right.
While Zemmour risks taking votes from Le Pen in the first round, his more radical stances in immigration and Islam have helped her project a more mainstream image.
“We feel it on the ground, there is a great dynamic, a hope that is emerging as the campaign nears its end,” she said on a visit to eastern France yesterday.
“What people said was the automatic re-election of Emmanuel Macron turned out to be fake news. It is perfectly possible to defeat Emmanuel Macron and radically change the politics of this country,” she added. – AFP, April 2, 2022
