MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Extreme right-wing National Front kingmaker of next French president

Marine Le Pen stole the show with 17.9% of the vote in the first round

French President Nicolas Sarkozy appealed directly to far right voters on Monday with pledges to get tough on immigration and security, after a record showing in a first round election by the National Front made them potential kingmakers.

Polls show conservative leader Sarkozy on course to become the first French president to lose a bid for re-election in more than 30 years, trailing Socialist challenger Francois Hollande ahead of a May 6 run-off.

Hollande was ahead of Sarkozy in Sunday's 10-candidate first round by 28.6% to 27.2%, but National Front leader Marine Le Pen stole the show, surging to 17.9%, the biggest tally a far-right candidate has ever managed.

Her performance mirrored advances across the continent by anti-establishment Euro sceptical populists from Amsterdam and Vienna to Helsinki as the Euro zone's grinding debt crisis deepens anger over government spending cuts and unemployment.

“National Front voters must be respected,” Sarkozy told reporters as he left his campaign headquarters in Paris. “They voiced their view. It was a vote of suffering, a crisis vote. Why insult them? I have heard Mr Hollande criticising them.”

The unpopular Sarkozy, the first sitting president to be forced into second place in the first round of a re-election bid, now faces a difficult balancing act to attract both the far-right and centrist voters he needs to stay in office.

The weak showing by Sarkozy scared investors already nervous about European governments' ability to service their debts, and helping to send French stocks and bonds lower.

Returning to the campaign trail on Monday, Sarkozy hammered home promises to toughen border controls, tighten security on the streets and keep industrial jobs in France - signature issues for Le Pen at a time of anger over immigration, violent crime and unemployment running at a 12-year high.

Sarkozy will hold a “real workers'” day rally on May 1 in a bid to upstage simultaneous events held by Hollande, the FN and trade unions.

Hollande has vowed to change the direction of Europe by tempering austerity measures with higher taxes on the rich and more social spending. Polls published on Sunday predicted he would win the run-off with between 53 and 56% of votes.

But the strong showing of Le Pen, gravel-voiced 43-year-old daughter of National Front founder Jean-Marie Le Pen, offered Sarkozy a glimmer of hope by suggesting there are more votes up for grabs on the right than had been thought.

“Marine Le Pen's breakthrough throws the second round wide open,” read the front page of right-leaning Le Figaro, while left-wing Liberation read: “Hollande leads. Le Pen the killjoy”.