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Sarkozy not French enough: Le Pen

Vaiju Naravane

Paris: With just five days to go before France's 45.5 million voters cast their ballot in the first round of the presidential poll, the campaign has become decidedly murky.

The extreme Right politician Jean-Marie Le Pen, who leads the anti-immigrant and anti-Semite Front National (FN) questioned the credentials of conservative frontrunner Nicolas Sarkozy, who he said was "not French enough " to become President.

The former Interior Minister and president of the ruling UMP party is the son of a Hungarian immigrant and a Greek Jewish mother. Describing Mr. Sarkozy as the "scum" of the political establishment, Mr. Le Pen, a powerful orator, threw out insults that Mr Sarkozy had flung at underprivileged immigrant youth from drug and crime-laden French suburbs.

Mr Sarkozy has made tough policing and immigration an electoral plank.

He recently said paedophilia was "due to genetic factors" and held that perturbed or hyperactive toddlers were genetically programmed to become delinquents. Polls have repeatedly shown that many voters are uneasy with Mr. Sarkozy's blunt-talking, tough guy image, seen as early warning signs of an authoritarian streak. "I think he does worry voters," said journalist Catherine Nay, author of a best-selling biography of Mr. Sarkozy. Several mayors, especially from France's troubled suburbs, complain that under Mr. Sarkozy the population had lost confidence in the police, now seen not as an institution to protect individuals and safeguard their freedom but as a repressive and inhuman force.

Comments backfire

His latest comments on paedophilia and personality mapping appear to have backfired and there has been a noticeable shift away from Mr. Sarkozy and in favour of Socialist candidate Segolene Royal.

With at least a third of the electorate undecided before Sunday's first round, to be followed by a deciding run-off on May 6, the final stretch of rallies and debates will play a crucial role in influencing swing voters.

Ms. Royal (53) and Mr. Sarkozy (52), would each get 50 perc ent support if they make it through to the second round after finishing in the top two places in Sunday's first ballot, the poll said.

Twelve candidates are competing for the top job, including three Trotskyites, a Communist, a Green and anti-capitalist campaigner Jose Bove, a hunters' rights campaigner and a Catholic nationalist. All candidates agree that the country is malfunctioning, locked in a downward spiral thanks to massive public debt, 8.5 per cent unemployment and low income levels.

The survey showed Mr. Sarkozy getting 27 per cent of the vote in the first round, followed by Ms. Royal at 25 per cent. Centrist leader Francois Bayrou was in third place at 19 per cent for the first round, ahead of Mr. Le Pen at 15.5 per cent.

"For Left-wing voters, the priority is to defeat Sarkozy," said Roland Cayrol, director of the CSA polling institute.

"Their problem is finding the most effective vote to do so. The Centre-Left is the priority target in this final phase of the campaign because it can make the difference," said Mr. Cayrol, who believes that "everything is still possible" on Sunday.

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