© REUTERS/Regis Duvignau
"I am not Hillary Clinton," poll frontrunner Alain Juppe said. "And France is not America."
The 71-year-old former prime minister was speaking on public radio ahead of a primary election ballot his conservative Les Republicains party and its allies hold on Sunday. That contest, involving a second, run-off vote on Nov. 27, will pick a candidate for the presidential race.
He is up against other heavyweights including ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy and another former prime minister, Francois Fillon, respectively second- and third-placed in polls of the likely outcome of that primary.
After a U.S. election that defied opinion poll predictions and general media expectations, the French media are asking whether a similar upset could occur this side of the Atlantic, in the primary, or in the presidential election itself, which takes place in two rounds next April and May.
Juppe is the pollsters tip to win in both cases, though the latest surveys suggest his lead has slipped significantly and made the result much harder to call.
Both rivals have closed the gap, with Sarkozy in second place and Fillon's support growing fast. A flash poll made Fillon the winner of a TV debate between primary election candidates on Thursday night.
Reader Comments
No, he's not Hillary but the two have similar backgrounds. Alain Juppe, President of France between 1995 and 1997 has been named as complicit in funding the Rwandan genocide of 100's of thousands of Tutsis in 1994 [Link] , calling for a large European army in 1996, presided over a subway bombing in 1996 that allowed France to re-activate its Anti-terrorist Security Plan [Link] and was found guilty of corruption in 2004 [Link] .
He was very unpopular after his term because of the high unemployment and economic turmoil he brought but sought re-election anyway, unsuccessfully.
I hope the collective French memory is better than most Americans memory of their political past. Neither Juppe nor that Sarkozy 'skin job' will help the French people anymore than Cameron helped Great Britain or Obama helped the U.S.