The Borneo Post

Struggling French Socialist slams rivals’ love of money

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PARIS: French Socialist Benoit Hamon attempted to turn around his flagging presidenti­al campaign on Sunday, attacking his main rivals as the ‘money’ candidates in a key speech aimed at halting his poll slide.

“Everything begins today,” said Hamon, 49, a leftist rebel who was the surprise winner of the party’s presidenti­al nomination in January but has struggled since to unite the party around his bid.

A poll published Sunday showed him dropping four points in two weeks, falling back into joint fourth with Communist- backed radical Jean- Luc Melenchon in the first round of the election on April 23.

The poll of 1,508 voters by Kantar Sofres credited both men with 12 per cent. It showed farright leader Marine Le Pen and centrist candidate Emmanuel Macron neck- and-neck with 26 per cent each, ahead of scandalhit Republican­s nominee Francois Fillon with 17 percent. All polls show Le Pen being beaten by Macron in the May 7 second round runoff.

Hamon, who made waves during the Socialist primary with his pledge to introduce a universal basic income and tax robots that take workers’ jobs, took aim Sunday at the role of money in the race.

“The money party has too many candidates in this election,” the 49-year- old former education minister declared.

“One says ‘Get rich!’ and the other two say ‘Make us rich!’”, he said, referring in the first instance to liberal ex-banker Macron and in the second to Fillon and Le Pen.

Fillon was last week charged with misuse of public funds over payments totalling nearly one million euros to his wife and children, whom he employed as parliament­ary assistants.

Le Pen, for her part, has faced allegation­s of illegal campaign financing and misusing European Parliament funds as well as claims that she and her father Jean-Marie Le Pen failed to declare the full value of family properties. — AFP

 ??  ?? Hamon arrives at a campaign rally in Paris. — Reuters photo
Hamon arrives at a campaign rally in Paris. — Reuters photo

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