French presidential candidates marked a one day truce Saturday on
the eve of voting in a first-round poll to whittle the 10-strong field
down to two frontrunners.
French election rules outlaw both
campaigning and opinion polling on the last day of the race, but
Socialist challenger Francois Hollande went into the weekend favourite
to oust right-wing incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy.
The two 57-year-old
political veterans are expected to win the two spots in the May 6
run-off, and polls suggest that the left-winger will comfortably win
the battle to become one of the most powerful leaders in the world.
Parisians
went about their business without being accosted by pamphleteers, the
campaigns' websites, Facebook pages and Twitter feeds were left without
updates and broadcasters had to find other subjects to interview.
But some hints of the campaigns' moods slipped past the censors.
"Lovely
day," wrote Socialist Party spokesman Benoit Hamon on his personal
Twitter account, linking to an upbeat song by Ella Fitzgerald, and
tacitly suggesting that the left remains coolly confident.
The
left-wing daily Liberation emblazoned its front page with the headline
"A strong left" against the backdrop of a blue ocean under open skies,
mocking the slogan and imagery of Sarkozy's "A strong France" campaign.
The
pro-Sarkozy Le Figaro stuck doggedly behind its champion, but doubts
clouded its front page editorial, which warned all those thinking of
voting far-right or centrist that second round would depend on the
first.
Privately, Sarkozy's top supporters have begun to admit
that if Sarkozy fails to regain the momentum and slip ahead of Hollande
on Sunday, he will have too much ground left to make up before the May
6 showdown.
France is a nuclear-armed power, a permanent member
of the UN Security Council and the tenth biggest economy in the world
in terms of GDP. Its executive president wields extraordinary personal
power.
Sarkozy has, in the teeth of much criticism of his
hyperactive leadership style, made the office still more influential by
downgrading the role of his prime minister and taking day-to-day charge
of matters of state.
The eventual winner of the May 6 vote will
still have to win legislative elections in June to make sure of his or
her authority, but any French leader with a parliamentary majority has
wide room to manoeuvre.F
First, however, 44.5 million French electors must make their choice.
Voting
in the first round began on Saturday in France's far-flung overseas
territories -- islands in the Pacific, Indian and Atlantic oceans --
where 882,000 people enjoy full voting rights as citizens of the
republic.
Off the coast of Canada, voting began at 8.00am local
time (1000 GMT) on the tiny French islands of St Pierre and Miquelon,
with 4,923 registered voters.
Then on Sunday, 85,000 polling
stations will open around the mainland from 8.00am (0600 GMT). Most
will close at 6.00pm, but in major cities they will stay open until
8.00pm, when estimated results will be released.
In France,
opinion poll institutes are permitted to take samples from ballot boxes
during polling, so the estimates they release at 8.00pm are generally
an accurate measure of the result and the figures will lead television
news.
More than 400 opinion polls have been conducted during the
campaign, a third more than in the last race in 2007, and the vast
majority tell the same story.
Hollande is expected to come in
first place in the first round, closely followed by Sarkozy, so both
ought to qualify for the run-off.
Three more candidates could
break into double figures in percentage terms, far-right flagbearer
Marine Le Pen, hard-left firebrand Jean-Luc Melenchon and veteran
centrist Francois Bayrou.
While good scores would give these
three a voice in national politics and their supporters a boost before
the June parliamentary election, they will bow out on Sunday and leave
the frontrunners to woo their voters.
This is where it gets
tricky for Sarkozy, who is personally unpopular even among voters who
broadly share his centre-right agenda. Hollande is expected to romp
home comfortably on May 6, making Sarkozy a one-term leader.