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Macron rallies campaigners as poll lead narrows
Macron, who is due to address a rally for the first time in his re-election campaign on Saturday, attended a meeting at the headquarters of his Republic on the Move (LREM) party late Wednesday.
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A local resident takes a selfie with French incumbent president and candidate of La Republique en Marche (LREM) party for the presidential election Emmanuel Macron (C) during a campaign visit in Fouras, western France, on March 31, 2022. (AFP/Ludovic Marin)
P
resident Emmanuel Macron made an unannounced visit to his campaign headquarters to warn supporters to take nothing for granted in France's presidential election after polls showed his lead narrowing, a source said Thursday.
Macron, who is due to address a rally for the first time in his re-election campaign on Saturday, attended a meeting at the headquarters of his Republic on the Move (LREM) party late Wednesday.
"The president-candidate called for a collective mobilisation, based on the idea that nothing is won yet," the source, who took part in the meeting, told AFP.
His attendance, which had not been announced by his team, came after a series of polls showed that far-right leader Marine Le Pen has been catching up on Macron, who has long been the overwhelming favourite to win.
The latest Elabe poll published Wednesday showed Le Pen winning 47.5 percent of votes in a second round run-off against Macron, who was projected to garner 52.5 percent, a smaller margin than in the same poll last week.
With a margin of error of up to 3.1 points, those figures suggest Le Pen could theoretically emerge as the winner in the second round.
Macron's re-election had been seen by many observers as almost a foregone conclusion, as polls suggested Le Pen would again be his rival in the run-off, a repeat of the vote five years ago.
But he formally entered the election campaign only at the last minute, citing his diplomatic efforts to halt Russia's war in Ukraine, while Le Pen has been pounding the pavement across France for months with a promise to increase voters' spending power as inflation bites.
And recent days have seen the government on the defensive over liberal use of public money on expensive management consultants such as US-based giant McKinsey.
