Le Pen’s last fling

When French politics wants to show the world its cloven hoof, it shows Jean-Marie Le Pen. Now aged 78, the veteran leader of the Front National — a far-Right nationalist party no longer on the fringes of political life — is preparing to fight possibly his last presidential campaign.

He still has fewer than the 500 nominations needed from mayors to enter the lists: but having made it clear to the front-runner, Nicolas Sarkozy, that he will do everything to harm the Sarkozy campaign if he does not get nominated, help may soon be at hand. Mr Sarkozy probably will see to it that his party’s own mayors get Mr Le Pen on to the ballot.

Mr Le Pen shocked France in 2002 by coming second to Jacques Chirac and he is not setting his sights low this time. He once called the Nazi gas chambers “a detail of history”, but has superintended a softening of the FN’s image, in the hope of attracting mainstream votes.

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Source:
Telegraph