Hollande steals poll march on Sarkozy

François Hollande has taken a narrow lead in the first round of France’s presidential elections, setting up a run-off with Nicolas Sarkozy after a vote that saw one in five ballots go to the far right National Front.

Following a bitter campaign marked by opposing visions of how to steer France’s debt-laden economy through the eurozone crisis, the Socialist challenger won 28.6 per cent of the votes, with 99 per cent counted, according to the interior ministry on Sunday evening.

The centre-right Mr Sarkozy, who is seeking to avoid adding his name to the string of European incumbents swept aside since the start of the sovereign debt crisis, secured 27.1 per cent support in a first-round election with a turnout of more than 80 per cent.

But the shock of the night was a record 18 per cent performance by the National Front’s Marine Le Pen, who outdid pollsters’ predictions after capitalising on widespread French discontent with the mainstream political elite.

Both Mr Sarkozy’s and Mr Hollande’s results-night gatherings broke into choruses of “We will win” when the tallies were announced, underscoring how much remains to play for in a race where almost half of those who voted cast their ballots for neither frontrunner.

The victor in a May 6 run-off will take the helm of the world’s fifth-largest economy, where one in 10 workers is unemployed and whose fiscal health is the subject of increasing concern in financial markets.

The jubilation in the Hollande camp at coming first was tempered by the National Front’s performance. Mr Hollande said Ms Le Pen’s surprise score was “ a new signal” that reflected popular anger and frustration.

One person in the Hollande camp at his Tulle constituency in south central France said: “It’s not good news but Le Pen voters won’t necessarily vote for Sarkozy in the second round and her high score can also be regarded as a protest against Sarkozy.”

Ange, an economics student of Moroccan descent cast his vote a for the centrist Socialist with little enthusiasm:

“It’s not that Hollande’s the best, it’s that he’s the least worst.”

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Mr Sarkozy’s failure to come top in the first round is a blow to his efforts to inject some momentum into a campaign weighed down by the lowest end-of-term ratings of any president since the 1950s.

But one Sarkozy supporter at his campaign headquarters in Paris said the combined vote for Mr Sarkozy and Ms Le Pen meant it had been “a victory for the right in France”.

Mr Sarkozy said he recognised voters’ concerns about jobs and immigration – “the concern of our compatriots to preserve their way of life”, he told supporters at his campaign headquarters in Paris.

Ms Le Pen has already drawn Mr Sarkozy to the right with her broadsides against immigration. Like her counterpart on the far left, she has also tapped a lack of enthusiasm for the two leading contenders, whom she dubbed “Siamese twins”.

She comfortably saw off a challenge for third place from Jean-Luc Mélenchon of the Left Front. His oratory and anger drew impassioned crowds to his rallies. His 11 per cent was lower than many of his supporters had expected but they will still hope he can pull the less radical Mr Hollande to the left in exchange for second-round support.

The 9.1 per cent garnered by François Bayrou, a centrist, could yet make him the kingmaker.

An Ipsos poll on Sunday night showed Mr Hollande’s lead over Mr Sarkozy for the second round narrowing to eight points from 12 points on Friday. The poll suggested that almost all those who voted for Mr Mélenchon would shift their support to Mr Hollande in the second round.

A handful of Le Pen supporters would do likewise, while 60 per cent said they would back Mr Sarkozy. More than a fifth of her backers – a potentially critical swing vote sector worth about 4 percentage points in the run-off – told the pollsters they had yet to decide whom to back.