Francois-come-lately

13 March 2007 By Pierre Briancon

Francois Bayrou, the head of a tiny centrist party, is running neck and neck with the socialist and conservative presidential candidates. He now stands a chance of making it to the second round. But as the election nears, he will have to be more specific on his platform.

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Francois Bayrou, a former Education Minister in conservative governments and a candidate of centrist party UDF in the French presidential election, is running neckandneck with socialist candidate Segolene Royal, according to polls released this week. Bayrou would get 23% of the vote, just like Royal, in the first round of election scheduled April 22. Conservative candidate Nicolas Sarkozy would get 28% of the votes, according to Journal du Dimanche.

In the second round of the election where only the top two firstround candidates are allowed to run Bayrou would win easily, by a 5644 margin over Royal and a 5545 lead over Sarkozy, according to a poll released Tuesday by free daily 20 Minutes.

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