Le Pen's challenge

Jacques Chirac's path to victory may prove bumpy

William Horsley BBC European Affairs correspondent

Jean-Marie Le Pen's breakthrough into the big time of French politics has happened because of an accident of numbers.

Mr Le Pen was the big winner in a fragmented crowded field of 16 candidates.

Mr Le Pen is at least partly setting the political agenda

Only a towering figure could have stood out from such a crowd but France now lacks any such figure.

Even Jacques Chirac, as incumbent president, could not quite muster 20% of the votes cast.

The big loser was Lionel Jospin, who was expected to win 50% or more of the total vote in the second round but who failed to get through the first round because the left-wing vote was split among several rivals.

Mr Le Pen, as often before, won more on polling day than pre-election opinion polls had predicted, but not a lot more in real numbers.

	Other candidates: Francois Bayrou 6.87% Arlette Laguiller 5.85% Jean-Pierre Chevenement 5.29% Noel Mamere 5.21% Jean Saint-Josse 4.51% Olivier Besancenot 4.34% Alain Madelin 3.88% Robert Hue 3.39% Bruno Megret 2.39% Christiane Taubira 1.98% Corinne Lepage 1.88% Christine Boutin 1.19% Daniel Gluckstein 0.48%

True, he won more votes than ever before - about 4.8 million.

And he won a larger share of the total vote than ever - just under 17%.

But even if he can count on the 2.4% of votes now promised to him by supporters of his right-wing rival Bruno Megret, his assured support in the second round is only about 20%.

His appeal may reach further than that but the odds are strongly, even astronomically, against him winning.

The message from a cold-headed analysis of the figures to those worried about a right-wing extremist winning the Elysee Palace is: Don't Panic!

One exit poll envisages a win by Jacques Chirac over Jean-Marie Le Pen by 78 to 22% on 5 May.

Another poll says that of those who say they are sure to vote in the second round, 80% will vote Chirac and just 20% for Le Pen.

Different situation

How can anyone be sure?

The French voters have shown they are angry and have not told pollsters the truth about their far-right sympathies.

However, the runoff is a very different kind of contest from the first round.

Chirac will have the support of many leftists

There are no other candidates to distract voters' attention.

All the mainstream parties are now urging their supporters to back Mr Chirac in order to shut out the far right.

That includes the Socialists and the Greens.

Mr Chirac is also trying to coordinate a broad-based front with moderate candidates from smaller parties.

People of all ages have been out in the streets in many cities to demonstrate their horror at the latest election result and their solidarity against the National Front and its leader.

Even so, Mr Le Pen will try to spring another surprise by giving Mr Chirac a tougher contest than expected.

Le Pen's tactics

He has several weapons in his hand, based on nationalism and hostility to the power of the European Union.

He claims to voice the disaffection or disgust of ordinary French people towards the political "Establishment".

He calls the big parties the "Gang of Four" - meaning the two centre-right parties, Mr Chirac's Rally for the Republic (RPR) and the Union for French Democracy (the UDF), as well as the Socialists and Communists.

Chirac may suffer from the anti-Establishment vote

In particular, he has openly accused Mr Chirac of being "a liar and a thief".

The insults are brushed aside by Mr Chirac's followers but they touch on Mr Chirac's weakness.

He has invoked presidential immunity and refused to answer a summons of judges who want to question him in connection with several fund-raising and corruption scandals.

If he should lose the election he would have to answer the questions like any other citizen.

Mr Le Pen speaks for many when he argues against France's immigration policy.

He plays on people's fears by saying that full employment is impossible because of the millions of immigrants in France.

Most experts say he is factually wrong but Mr Chirac has failed to take on Jean-Marie Le Pen directly.

Mr Le Pen will now try to reach out to more voters on both the right and the left who feel angry or excluded

Instead, Mr Chirac also made insecurity a big theme in the first-round election campaign.

Mr Le Pen is at least partly setting the political agenda.

His National Front made strong gains or came top of the poll in many poorer suburbs around Paris and other large cities.

Mr Le Pen will now try to reach out to more voters on both the right and the left who feel angry or excluded because of unemployment, immigration and crime.

He will repeat his emotive call in the early part of the campaign: "Don't be afraid to dream, you the little people, the foot-soldiers, the excluded... you the miners, the steelworkers, workers of all those industries ruined by the euro-globalisation of Maastricht."