Royal attacks Sarkozy as threat to civil peace

FRANCE: Socialist Segolene Royal on Tuesday warned France faces the risk of unrest if rightwinger Nicolas Sarkozy wins the presidential election at the weekend and puts in motion change with "brutality."

With five days to go before the vote, Royal told some 60,000 supporters at a Paris sports stadium that she was the only candidate who "wants to reform France and wants civil peace in my country."

"We are confronting a risk: the brutality in the conduct of public affairs could endanger social peace and civil peace," said Royal.

"This danger is contained in the programme of the rightwing candidate," she said at the rally attended by some of France's top music stars.

Royal, who wants to become France's first woman president, has been trailing Sarkozy in the polls ahead of the election on Sunday that has been dominated by calls for change after 12 years under President Jacques Chirac.

An Ipsos/Dell survey published Tuesday showed Sarkozy would beat Royal with 53 percent of votes against 47 percent.

Sarkozy, the son of a Hungarian imRoyal, an army officer's daughter, has presented herself as a nurturing figure and has proposed a leftist economic programme that would keep France's generous welfare system intact. In the final stretch of her campaign, Royal charged that Sarkozy was trying to "disguise his record" as a member of the outgoing government and "rewrite history".

"I am committed to reforming France without brutality and without shock," said Royal, adding that she stood for "a France without violence and which embraces its energy to move forward in civil peace."

The 53-year-old former adviser to president Francois Mitterrand spoke of a growing anger among disillusioned citizens and drew a parallel with the May 1968 student protests.

"There is in France today the same type of growing anger, frustration, misunderstanding. There are millions of people who have the impression that they are worthless," she said.

Royal accused Sarkozy of "dreaming about a new May '68 so that he can restore order" and asserted that she "wanted to create dialogue, democracy, social compromise so that France can move forward".

Royal is to come face-to-face with Sarkozy in a much-anticipated television debate on Wednesday that is expected to be watched by more than 20 million viewers.

Earlier in the day, far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen called on his 3.8 million supporters in the first round to abstain in the runoff, saying that neither Royal nor Sarkozy were up to the job.

Paris, Wednesday, AFP