French revolution as old guard goes
FRENCH voters have turned their backs on mainstream politics, voting for two political outsiders to contest the final round of the presidential election.
Far- right National Front leader Marine Le Pen and centrist independent Emmanuel Macron will now do battle on May 7 after seeing off challenges from more experienced politicians.
With almost 96 per cent of the vote counted, Mr Macron was polling about 23.9 per cent with Ms Le Pen just be- hind on around 21.4 per cent. That was enough to see off hard- left candidate Jean- Luc Melenchon and former prime minister Francois Fillon, who each polled slightly above 19 per cent.
For the first time in more than 60 years, no Socialist or Republican candidate made it through to the final round.
Mr Macron’s supporters were ecstatic when he addressed them in Paris, saying “We did it”.
“The two political parties that have governed France for years have been discarded,” he said.
The fight between the charismatic centre- left Mr Macron, 39, and the firebrand Ms Le Pen, 48, mirrors that of 2002, when her father, far right figurehead Jean- Marie Le Pen, made it through to the second round against Jacques Chirac.
Although both candidates were virtually level after the first round, more than 80 per cent swung behind the more centrist Mr Chirac when the second vote rolled around.
Mr Macron, who quit as economics minister in the Socialist government to form his own political movement, En Marche! ( Onwards!) last year, is a firm favourite to now lead the French republic.
This would be a huge relief to panicked European leaders, with Ms Le Pen, dubbed “Madame Frexit’’, preparing to take Britain’s lead and take France out of both the euro zone and the European Union if she claims victory.
Her strident rhetoric, which includes an anti- Islam policy and taking back control of France’s borders, underlines the strength of the same anti- establishment vote that helped propel Donald Trump to victory in the US, and saw Britain vote to leave the EU in a referendum last July.
“I am the people’s candidate,’’ she told a supporters gathering in the town of Henin- Beaumont in northern France on Sunday.
“Either we continue to disintegrate without any borders, without any controls, unfair international competition, mass immigration and the free circulation of terrorists, or you choose France with borders.”
Around 70 per cent of the nation’s 47 million voters turned out at the ballot box.