François
Hollande was the first off the blocks with a clip alternating
excerpts from his campaign launch speech at Le Bourget and key moments in
French history seen as turning points for “equality” – all are
thanks to Socialist leaders, bien sur. Key words are “redressement”
(recovery), “justice” and “hope”, and the campaign
slogan: “Change is now”.
The tone of Nicolas
Sarkozy’s film is grave. Donning his “captain of France”
hat, Sarko reminds the French he has saved them from economic ruin while
promising to restore “authority” and promote “work, effort
and merit”, as well as”refusing the welfare state”. “Strong
France” is the campaign slogan, for those who forget.
Jean-Luc
Mélenchon, the Left Front candidate, starts with images of “the
people” then tells voters against a red backdrop that there is “twice
as much wealth” in France than in 1981, and the only problem is “the
refusal of the powerful” to share it. He lists his key proposals,
including raising the minimum wage, slapping an 100 per cent tax on earnings
over 360,000 euros and limiting the range of salaries in a company from 1 to
20. Campaign slogan: “Seize power”.
François
Bayrou, the centrist Modem candidate stares unblinking into the
camera to promise to reduce France’s debt, to “hunt down waste”
and concentrate on boosting produce “made in France” as well as
pumping money into primary schools.
Assiduous viewers will notice the sea and birdsong in this clip for the rural
candidate par excellence. Campaign slogan: “Nothing can resist a united
country.”
Against a blue
backdrop, Marine Le Pen focuses her whole first film on restoring
purchasing power to France after five years of the “president of
purchasing despair”. Nothing on the usual themes of immigration and
security in this short clip. You could be forgiven for watching a statist
leftist as she pledges to force down petrol prices by taxing oil majors and
ditto for gas. She insists she, not Mélenchon is the “only
candidate of popular revolt who doesn’t fear the ruling castes”.
Eva
Joly, the ecologist candidate who has failed dismally to take off in
these elections despite strong support for the Greens in recent local and
European elections, reminds viewers she used to be a fearless investigating
magistrate (who tackled the Elf oil giant). Joly, who wore dark glasses to
rallies last week after falling down the stairs, has her Elton John green
specs back on and apes François Hollande’s slogan with her own: “Ecology,
real change”.
The remaining four include sovereigntist Nicolas
Dupont-Aignan, who claims French leaders have “abandoned power
to Brussels technocrats”, Nathalie
Artaud from the Trotskyist Lutte Ouvrière party, Philippe
Poutou, a car factory worker representing the NPA anti-capitalist
party and last (and perhaps least), the maverick Jacques Cheminade.
His clip is worth a
watch as he replays his 1995 prediction that a “financial crash”
would sooner or later wreak destruction in Europe.
He unconvincingly goes on to insist that “vanity” played no part in
him replaying the prediction. Not a mention of his whackier pledges. Shame
really, but rest assure we’ll be hearing about them given the airtime this
unlikely contender will now have.
For those who can’t face watching them all, here’s an
edited medley of the clips thanks to France Televisions.
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