“WE HAVE nothing to hide...I am afraid of nothing!” With indignant words and a clenched fist, François Fillon put on a muscular display of defiance at a campaign rally in Paris this week. Before a crowd of 15,000 flag-waving, mostly grey-haired supporters, the centre-right presidential candidate promised to make France the “greatest European power” within ten years, to put “liberty” at the heart of his campaign, and to declare a war on both poverty and “radical Islam”. The event pointed to unity as well as force: Alain Juppé, the Republican primary candidate defeated by Mr Fillon, applauded his rival from the front row. But the choreography could not conceal an awkward fact: Mr Fillon’s candidacy is in real trouble.
Just days previously, the former prime minister had been the favourite to win the two-round French presidential election in April and May. But the decision on January 25th by judicial investigators to launch a preliminary inquiry into misuse of public funds by Mr Fillon, after revelations in a newspaper, shocked many of his supporters. His, after all, was the candidacy of probity and honour. One cannot lead France, he...Continue reading
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