The French will vote for their next President this Sunday, April 22, and chances are that none of the candidates will gather sufficient votes to be elected on the first round. This means that a runoff will probably take place on May 6, since the electorate is rather divided in its voting intentions. Opinion polls suggest that the bulk of the voters will choose between five candidates: Nicolas Sarkozy from the center-right UMP (current incumbent), François Hollande from the center-left PS, Jean-Luc Mélenchon from the leftist FDG, Marine Le Pen from the rightist FN, and François Bayrou from the liberal MoDem.
While the latest projections for Sarkozy (26%), Hollande (28%), Le Pen (16%) and Bayrou (9%) are in line with expectation, the performance of Mélenchon (16%) comes as a surprise and may be of great help for Hollande in the probable runoff against Sarkozy. Indeed, Mélenchon announced that FDG would support Hollande in a hypothetical runoff against Sarkozy, while Le Pen did not go as far as to back Sarkozy.
After 17 years of right-leaning presidencies, France may finally be on the way to have its first left-leaning President since François Mitterrand. This prospect challenges the current political trend in Europe, where most countries are governed by center-right, conservative parties. All the more so if FDG manages to exert pressure on Hollande to stop and reverse pervasive austerity measures.
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