A new poll yesterday showed centrist candidate Emmanuel Macron for the first time beating the far-right National Front’s Marine Le Pen in the initial round of the French presidential elections next month.
Macron’s lead comes as a growing list of backers from both the left and the center throw their support behind the 39-year-old former economy minister, who is trying to upend France’s traditional politics.
The Harris Interactive poll showed Macron taking 26 percent of the vote on April 23 — a six-point gain in two weeks — compared with 25 percent for Le Pen, who had long been leading in the first round.
In the likely event that no one wins an outright majority, a runoff between the two top candidates is to be held on May 7.
The Harris poll showed Macron would take 65 percent of that vote to Le Pen’s 35 percent.
Although no polls currently show her winning, anti-immigration nationalist Le Pen is hoping to emulate last year’s shock success of US President Donald Trump.
In a boost to his campaign on Wednesday, Macron won the backing of Socialist former Paris mayor Bertrand Delanoe, who called him “a reformist, a European and a realist.”
Delanoe, who oversaw the French capital from 2001 to 2014, told France Inter radio he backed Macron because it was essential to “throw the most weight possible behind the candidate who can beat Madam Le Pen in the first round.”
His stance on the prospect of a Le Pen presidency was echoed by French Ambassador to Japan Thierry Dana, who on Wednesday broke diplomatic protocol by stating publicly that he would refuse to serve if she won.
“If the French tragedy comes to pass and leads to her election, I would withdraw from all my diplomatic functions,” Dana, 60, wrote in a column in Le Monde newspaper.
A former investment banker who quit the Socialist government in August last year to prepare a bid for the presidency, Macron has risen fast in opinion polls, but has never won elected office.
In remarks on International Women’s Day on Wednesday, he suggested that he would ideally name a woman as prime minister if he were to win the keys to the Elysee Palace.
“To be honest, it’s too easy to say it this evening, but I’ve spoken to others, starting with men, and that’s what I wish really,” he said, when asked if he would name a female prime minister at a public rally in Paris.
An already unpredictable French election has become even harder to call given the legal woes afflicting conservative challenger Francois Fillon, who is embroiled in a “fake jobs” scandal.
In another blow, the investigative paper Le Canard Enchaine published new claims late on Tuesday that scandal-hit Fillon had failed to declare an interest-free loan of 50,000 euros (US$52,727 at the current exchange rate) from a billionaire friend.
Once the front-runner in the race, Fillon has slipped to third in the polls and the gap between him and Macron and Le Pen appears to be widening.
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