{"id":312667,"date":"2017-04-21T06:55:47","date_gmt":"2017-04-21T06:55:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=312667"},"modified":"2017-04-21T06:55:47","modified_gmt":"2017-04-21T06:55:47","slug":"france-presidential-candidates-in-last-tv-pitch-ahead-of-vote","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=312667","title":{"rendered":"France Presidential candidates in last TV pitch ahead of vote"},"content":{"rendered":"

All 11 French presidential candidates have made their final pitches in the last set-piece TV encounter ahead of Sunday’s first round of voting.<\/p>\n

Both far-right leader Marine Le Pen and radical leftist Jean-Luc M\u00e9lenchon voiced sharp criticism of the EU in the early part of the programme.<\/p>\n

The TV encounter was then overshadowed by a deadly shooting in central Paris.<\/p>\n

Centrist Emmanuel Macron and centre-right Fran\u00e7ois Fillon both paid tribute to the police targeted by a gunman.<\/p>\n

Mr Macron said “the first duty of a president was to protect” citizens, while Mr Fillon said he was cancelling all his campaigning events on Friday, the final day of the campaign.<\/p>\n

Ms Le Pen said she was doing likewise.<\/p>\n

\"Francois<\/a>
Francois Fillon<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Opinion polls suggest a tight race with some 30% of voters still undecided.<\/p>\n

It is turning out to be the most unpredictable election in generations in France and the programme is a last chance for all of them to speak to the nation, the BBC’s Hugh Schofield reports from Paris.<\/p>\n

Ms Le Pen and Mr Macron are seen as frontrunners to progress to the second round in May.<\/p>\n

\"benoit-hamon\"<\/a>
Benoit Hamon<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

However, Mr Fillon of the centre-right Republican party and Mr M\u00e9lenchon are also in the frame.<\/p>\n

The candidates drew lots to establish the order of speakers, with Mr M\u00e9lenchon coming first. Each candidate was interviewed individually for 15 minutes.<\/p>\n

‘Change or leave’<\/h4>\n

Ms Le Pen said she wanted to “give back to the French the keys of the house”.<\/p>\n

As she delivered her line, she dangled a key before viewers.<\/p>\n

She called for withdrawal from the euro “to restore competitiveness”.<\/p>\n

On terrorism, a major concern for France after attacks claimed by so-called Islamic State, she said “hate-preaching imams” and foreigners who are on a police security watch list should be expelled.<\/p>\n

\"jean-luc-melenchon\"<\/a><\/p>\n

When Mr M\u00e9lenchon was asked if France should leave the EU, he replied: “We change it or we leave it.” He said he believed in an “independent France orientated towards peace”.<\/p>\n

Asked about his controversial tax plans, he said: “We are actually going to tax incomes above 400,000 euros [\u00a3335,000; $429,000] a year at 90%”.<\/p>\n

Beno\u00eet Hamon, the candidate of the ruling Socialist party who has plummeted to fifth place in the polls, attacked austerity, saying the European project was under threat.<\/p>\n

“I am the only candidate who will improve employees’ pay slips,” he said.<\/p>\n

–<\/p>\n

Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

All 11 French presidential candidates have made their final pitches in the last set-piece TV encounter ahead of Sunday’s first round of voting. Both far-right leader Marine Le Pen and radical leftist Jean-Luc M\u00e9lenchon voiced sharp criticism of the EU in the early part of the programme. The TV encounter was then overshadowed by a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[6392,6393,6394],"class_list":["post-312667","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-international","tag-france-presidential-elections","tag-french-elections","tag-live-tv-debate"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=312667"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312667\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=312667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=312667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=312667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}