The wily old trooper won't go away

摘要

While French voters bask in the August sun, many politicians are busy, aware that in a few weeks' time, the 2007 presidential contest will be grabbing headlines. A lot of attention has focused on the candidates for the mainstream left and right, who now seem likely to be, respectively, Segolene Royal and Nicolas Sar-kozy. Yet there is a third force in politics, whose voice is less audible, but hardly less resonant: the far-right's Jean-Marie Le Pen. Because the National Front leader has no seat in the French parliament, he seldom makes a big splash in the media. Yet the 78-year-old ex-paratrooper, who made it into the 2002 presidential run-off against Jacques Chirac, still wields a baleful influence over the body politic.