France Election: Nicolas Sarkozy, Segolene Royal Head For Runoff
Published by Staff April 22nd, 2007 in World.
Preliminary results show conservative Nicolas Sarkozy and Socialist Segolene Royal have won the first round of voting in the French presidential election. Sarkozy, the former Interior Minister, held the lead with about 30 per cent of the vote. Royal trailed with about 25 percent. Anita Elash reports from Paris.
Pollsters had predicted that Segolene Royal and Nicolas Sarkozy would win in the first round, but there was also a large number of undecided voters and that raised questions about whether one of the alternate candidates would bump either of the front-runners. But neither of the potential spoilers came close. Centrist Francois Bayrou and far right candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen finished a distant third and fourth.
After the early results were announced, Sarkozy appealed to voters for support.
He said that by putting him in first place and Royal in second, voters have said clearly that they want a full debate between two ideas of the nation, two value systems and two ideas about politics.
Royal made her speech in Melle, in southwestern France.
Voters have a clear choice on May 6 between two very different voices, she said. She said she was extending her hand to everyone who believes that the French must change a system that no longer works.
Nearly 45 million eligible Frenchmen registered to vote and 85 percent of those turned up at the polls. The runoff election between Sarkozy and Royal takes place in two weeks, on May 6.
Source: VOA
The implications of this result is that since the two front runners are the ones going through instead of a surprise turnover, the French are not casting protest votes. In the runoff election, it will not be clear cut. France is undergoing powerful change, and the preliminary results are not reflective of the actual voter leanings. For all we know, the Trotskyites and anti-capitalists may switch allegiance to Royal-or to Sarzoky. however, I am of the opinion that Royal will have the strength of all the anti-capitalists, including the Trotskyites, behind her. France needs a vibrant new president who can bring them, as a nuclear power, into the foreground of the world, and make them an economic, political and social success in the EU. France has great potential, and Royal may be able to break with tradition and give France a new opportunity to become a world power.
jd seems unaware of French history. The hope and belief that France can return to its 19th century position in the world, so far from being a new idea, is the central tenet of Gaullism, which has been the leading ideology of French politics for more than 40 years. Charles DeGaulle once famously declared, “France is not France without grandeur” and many similar pronouncements. In practice France has about as much chance of returning to its former power and prominence in the world as England has of re-establishing the British Empire.
jd shows his lack of understanding in hoping that Segolene Royal will re-establish French greatness, when it is her opponent Nicholas Sarkozy who is the Gaullist in the race.