Outgoing French President Emmanuel Macron and far-right candidate Marine Le Pen resumed their election campaigns on Monday by holding a number of rallies and rallies with their supporters across the country. A week before the second round of the presidential elections, and following a short break on Easter, the two candidates are also preparing for a crucial televised debate between them next Wednesday.
Pressure is intensifying on the candidate of the National Rally, who was defeated in the 2017 elections by Emmanuel Macron, leader of the Republic on the Move party. There is no doubt that her opponent will not hesitate to attack her, and he has a slight advantage, according to opinion polls. Polls consider him a winner in Sunday’s poll, with a percentage ranging between 53 and 55.5 percent, compared to 44.5 to 47 percent for Marine Le Pen, but the difference is slight and falls within the margin of error, and therefore Macron’s success is not definitive, and he may be frustrated by a strong mobilization of voters opposing him. This time, Le Pen thinks she is better prepared for the debate, saying she is “very calm”. “I came to draw strength from the people (..) I am very confident, I think I will win,” she said during an election tour in the Calvados region (north-west). “I hope the debate will go smoothly,” she added. We never share the same ideas or the same vision for the country” or for the economy.
Faced with support from the left and right, as well as from civil society, Macron has continued to focus on purchasing power rather than her favorite immigration issue, trying to persuade popular constituencies. And her aides worked once more on Sunday to soften her position on the issue of wearing the highly sensitive veil, stressing that banning it in the public sphere is no longer a priority in the fight once morest radical Islam.
For Macron, Wednesday’s debate will be a “moment of clarification.” “I think I have a project that deserves to be known, and I have a feeling that on the far right side there is a project that deserves to be clarified,” he said in an interview with TF1 television on Sunday. People in his circles explained that “the challenge is to be attractive and persuasive without an overly professorial tone.” In the face of Le Pen, Macron stresses the reform of institutions, as he presents himself as a guarantor of rights and respect for the constitution, hoping that by doing so he will be able to damage the credibility of the far-right candidate. (AFP)
