The Opinionway poll of voting intentions had Le Pen easily beating her four main rivals -
PARIS: French far-right leader Marine Le Pen has gained some ground on her main election rivals, independent Emmanuel Macron and conservative Francois Fillon, but would still lose to either of them in the May 7 runoff for the presidency, a poll showed on Monday.
The Opinionway poll of voting intentions had Le Pen easily beating her four main rivals and winning the April 23 first round with a score of 27 per cent to move through to the two-way runoff against either Macron or Fillon.
In a straight fight with Macron she would go down by 42 per cent against his 58, while against Fillon she would lose with 44 per cent to his 56, the poll showed.
French government bond yields rose sharply on news of the poll, reflecting investors’ apprehension over Le Pen’s proposals to quit the euro zone, hold a referendum on EU membership, and slap taxes on imports and on the job contracts of foreigners.
Her improvement in ratings was most notable against Macron, with whom she was seen a week ago as polling 36-37 per cent to his 63-64 per cent in the second round.
With nine weeks to go to the first round, it was still not clear whether Macron, a centrist, or Fillon, a former conservative prime minister, would go through to the knockout against Le Pen.
The two men are tied on 20 per cent each in the first round, according to Monday’s poll.
Fillon, who preaches radical cost-cutting policies in the public sector to launch a recovery, was the clear frontrunner until a scandal broke over salaries paid to his wife and two children from public funds for questionable amounts of work. He has denied they were paid for ‘fake jobs’.
Le Pen, who wants to take France out of the European Union, was on a trip to Lebanon on Monday where she spoke out against French policy on Syria.
After meeting Prime Minister Saad Hariri in Beirut, she described Syrian President Bashar al Assad as the “only viable solution” for preventing IS from taking power in Syria.
“I explained clearly that... Bashar al Assad was obviously today a much more reassuring solution for France than IS would be if it came to power in Syria, as it has partially taken power in Libya after the disappearance of (Muammar) Gaddafi,” she told journalists. — Reuters
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