Sarkozy Banks on Mass Rally to Lift Flagging Election Hopes
French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Sunday chartered TGV high-speed trains and fleets of buses to ferry in supporters from across France for a mass rally aimed at boosting his flagging re-election bid.
Up to 60,000 people were expected at the rally in an exhibition hall at Villepinte north of Paris, which the president hopes will turn the tide against his front-running Socialist rival with just over a month to go before election day.
"Sarkozy is the only one who can save France from going the way of Greece or Italy," two countries hard hit by the debt crisis sweeping Europe, said 46-year-old transport worker Thierry Salic as he walked into the meeting.
Salic, carrying the French tricolor flag, had come from the southern city of Salon-en-Provence in one of the specially hired TGV trains.
Inside the cavernous hall a succession of heavyweights from Sarkozy's UMP party took turns at warming up the cheering crowds who waved a sea of red, blue and white flags.
French actor Gerard Depardieu added some star power to the audience who hoped that the polls might somehow be proved wrong and Socialist Francois Hollande will lose in the two-round vote in April and May.
The rally comes just days after the 56-year-old Sarkozy said he would quit politics for good if not re-elected in the vote on April 22 and May 6.
Sarkozy has failed to narrow the gap with Hollande -- who has enjoyed a clear opinion poll lead for five months -- and this week pulled out all the stops to revamp what many critics say has been a lackluster campaign.
In a marathon three-hour television interview on Tuesday, he declared that there were too many immigrants in France and that the country's attempts to integrate foreign arrivals into its culture and society had become paralyzed.
That statement came as French Jewish and Muslim leaders united to complain they were being used as pawns in a presidential election increasingly dominated by bitter disputes over national identity and ritual slaughter.
Sarkozy picked up on a debate about halal meat -- initially launched by the anti-immigrant National Front leader Marine Le Pen -- and declared that its spread in butchers' shops was a major problem for the French.
That fuelled accusations that he is pinning his hopes on catching up on Hollande -- in what is shaping up as a clear two-horse race -- in winning back voters who lean towards the National Front.
Others accused him of being sidetracked by minor issues at a time when France is struggling to generate growth and to escape the eurozone financial crisis.
Hollande, who has never held a ministerial post and whose ex-partner Segolene Royal lost to Sarkozy in 2007, this week pressed home his attacks on his rival's record in five years at the Elysee palace.
He mocked Sarkozy's plan -- announced Tuesday -- to slap a new tax on the profits of listed companies which he said would bring in up to three billion euros ($3.9 billion) a year to help cut the public deficit.
Sarkozy has been accused of favoring the rich, but in recent weeks has tried to dispel that image by announcing he wants to ban big pay-offs to corporate bosses and to hit big firms with more tax.
Hollande for his part has declared that the "world of finance" is the adversary and said he wants a 75 percent tax rate on annual income above one million euros.
The Socialist branded Sarkozy's immigration plans -- he wants to cut the number of new arrivals from 180,000 per year to 100,000 a year -- "stupid".
An OpinionWay-Fiducial opinion poll on Thursday forecast that Hollande would take 29 percent of the vote in the first round of the election, with Sarkozy at 26 percent and Le Pen in third place with 17 percent.
Hollande would romp home in the second round with 56 percent, well ahead of Sarkozy at 44 percent, the poll said.
Source: Agence France Presse
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