Sarkozy leads Royal for run-off
2007-04-23 14:47
Paris - Conservative Nicolas Sarkozy has seized a strong lead over Socialist Segolene Royal in the first round of France's presidential election and must now woo centrist voters if he is to win the run-off vote on May 6.
With all ballots in Sunday's voting counted, Sarkozy had 31.18%, Royal 25.8%, centrist Francois Bayrou 18.5% and far-right head Jean-Marie Le Pen 10.44%.
Four opinion polls late on Sunday showed Sarkozy, a former
interior minister, looked set to win the run-off and dash
Royal's dream of becoming France's first female president.
Jean-Louis Borloo, the popular labour minister who is
backing Sarkozy, offered one option to win centrist backing.
"If Nicolas Sarkozy were president, I would think it would
be necessary, vital, fortuitous that there be UDF members
massively present in the government," Borloo told French radio,
quickly adding it was up to Sarkozy and Bayrou to decide this.
Sarkozy, aiming to soften the "tough cop" image that helped
him siphon votes from the far right, struck a conciliatory tone
before ecstatic party faithful soon after the polls closed.
Targeting centrist voters
Reaching out to the same centrist voters now up for grabs,
Royal sought to stoke an undercurrent of concern about Sarkozy
by saying she refused "to cultivate fear" and opposed "a France
dominated by the law of the strongest or most brutal".
"Among Francois Bayrou's supporters there were men and women
who wanted change, who even believed they would beat Sarkozy by
voting for Bayrou," Francois Hollande, Socialist leader and
Royal's partner, told France 2 television.
Apart from the two-horse campaign over the next two weeks
between Sarkozy and Royal, who are due to hold a televised
debate on May 2, all eyes will be on centrist leader Bayrou to
see if he advises his voters to back either candidate.
"Bayrou will be the most sought-after politician in the next
two weeks," Europe 1 radio said. But Bayrou's campaign director,
Marielle de Sarnez, told Le Parisien newspaper: "One thing is
sure: we are not for sale!"
Both candidates were due on the campaign trail on Monday,
with Sarkozy addressing a rally in the eastern city of Dijon and
Royal travelling to Valence in southern France.
- Reuters