Marine Le Pen’s niece Marion Marechal, a popular figure among far-right French voters, on Friday said Eric Zemmour was a better presidential candidate, piling woes onto a campaign already troubled by the defection of two EU lawmakers.
Le Pen ranks second or third in opinion polls that show a tussle among right and far-right candi-dates to win a second-round runoff spot against President Emmanuel Macron in the April elections. Macron himself is leading polls and seen as likely to secure the other spot.
Marechal, a 32-year old former lawmaker, told Le Parisien and Le Figaro in separate interviews that she considers her aunt’s far-right rival Zemmour https://www.lefigaro.fr/elections/presidentielles/marion-marechal-j-ai-envie-de-retourner-en-politique-20220128 had adopted a better strategy, even though he is currently running fourth in opinion polls. “Unlike Marine Le Pen https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/defection-reveals-le-pens-achilles-heel-she-looks-too-mainstream-2022-01-27, Zemmour still has ample room to rise further (in polls),” Marechal told Le Figaro newspaper.
She said that because he was new to politics and was seeking to bridge gaps between parties, Zem-mour was better placed to get wide-ranging support than Le Pen’s party, which other parties, including on the mainstream right, often shun.
Her comments went to the heart of a debate that could re-define France’s right and far-right for years to come.
Marechal, once a rising star in the Le Pen fam-ily’s National Rally party, quit politics five years ago.—Reuters
