French presidential run-offs usually tight
Opinion polls published last week showed Socialist challenger Francois Hollande winning an average of 53% of the votes against conservative incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy.
Second-round votes in French presidential elections of the past half century have generally been closely fought, except in a couple of atypical polls pitting two rightist candidates against one another.Opinion polls published last week showed Socialist challenger Francois Hollande winning an average of 53% of the votes against conservative incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy in Sunday's election. A narrower margin of victory could reduce Hollande'sauthority to pursue his programme of balancing budget austeritywith growth-boosting measures. The tightest finish was in 1974, when conservative ValeryGiscard d'Estaing beat Socialist Francois Mitterrand with 50.8% of the votes, a winning margin of just 1.6 percentage points, or about 400,000 votes. Turnout also peaked that year at87.3%. In 2002, conservative Jacques Chirac won a landslide 82.2% of the votes against far-right candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen, who had narrowly edged out Socialist Lionel Jospin in the first round of voting. Left-wing leaders at the time had asked their voters to support Chirac. Another atypical right-right duel, pitting Gaullist GeorgesPompidou against centre-right candidate Alain Poher in 1969, sawPompidou win with 58.2%. Among the six remaining traditional left-right final duels,the biggest victory was won by Charles de Gaulle in 1965, whenhe crushed Mitterrand by 55.2% to 44.8% for a 10.4% margin. Below is a list of France's second-round election resultssince 1965. The turnout figure includes spoiled ballots. Thepresidential term was cut to five years from seven after 2002. 1965: Charles de Gaulle: 55.2 pct Francois Mitterrand: 44.8 pct Winning margin: 10.4 pct Turnout: 84.3 pct 1969: Georges Pompidou: 58.2 pct Alain Poher: 41.8 pct Winning margin: 16.4 pct Turnout: 68.9 pct 1974: Valerie Giscard d'Estaing: 50.8 pct Francois Mitterrand: 49.2 pct Winning margin: 1.6 pct Turnout: 87.3 pct 1981: Francois Mitterrand: 51.8 pct Valerie Giscard d'Estaing: 48.2 pct Winning margin: 3.6 pct Turnout: 85.9 pct 1988: Francois Mitterrand: 54.0 pct Jacques Chirac: 46.0 pct Winning margin: 8.0 pct Turnout: 84.1 pct 1995: Jacques Chirac: 52.6 pct Lionel Jospin: 47.4 pct Winning margin: 5.2 pct Turnout: 79.7 pct 2002: Jacques Chirac: 82.2 pct Jean-Marie Le Pen: 17.8 pct Winning margin: 64.4 pct Turnout: 79.7 pct 2007: Nicolas Sarkozy: 53.1 pct Segolene Royal: 46.9 pct Winning margin: 6.2 pct Turnout: 84.0 pct Source: French Interior Ministry