THE France faces a repeat of the 2017 election showdown between Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen, with Macron still the favorite but in a much tighter race, opinion polls show ahead of Sunday’s first round of voting.
Five years ago, Macron defeated Le Pen with 66.1% of the vote in the second round, with voters of all stripes backing the centrist newcomer to defeat the far-right candidate.
Now, a poll by OpinionWay and Kéa Partners for newspaper Les Echos and Radio Classique became the latest on Monday to predict a much narrower 53% to 47% margin of victory for Macron.
His leadership has shrunk substantially because, apparently distracted by the Ukraine crisis, he entered the campaign late and focused on largely unpopular economic reforms, including raising the retirement age, upsetting his field.
Meanwhile, Le Pen saw his campaign focused on declining purchasing power of middle- and low-income voters worth it, with its ratings continuing to improve in both the first and second rounds on April 24.
For Sunday’s first round, OpinionWay projects Macron with 28% of the vote and Le Pen with 22%.
All the other candidates are far behind and are fighting to qualify for the second round, bar one big surprise.
Far-left Jean-Luc Melenchon is seen with around 14% of the vote in the first round, according to OpinionWay, with far-right Eric Zemmour and conservative Valerie Pecresse — once seen as serious runoff candidates — with 9% each.
Source: CNN Brasil
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