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Raffarin faces possible protest in French ballot
Paris, March 21: France`s Conservative government may facea protest vote against economic reforms and high unemployment today in regional elections, possibly boosting the extreme right National Front.
Paris, March 21: France`s Conservative government may face
a protest vote against economic reforms and high unemployment today in regional elections, possibly boosting the extreme right National Front.
Pollsters say a record number of French people could decide not to vote at all in anger over Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin`s efforts to fill large budget holes with cutbacks in areas such as health care, research and education.
But with right and left running roughly equal in opinion polls,the Raffarin government`s economic policies of privatisation, deregulation and cost-cutting reforms look likely to stay.
An opinion poll in the daily Le Monde said 70 percent of those surveyed last week wanted to ``show their discontent`` with the government in the voting for regional assemblies.
After the Madrid bombings, terror threats in France, both from a shadowy Islamic group and blackmailers warning of an attack on the railways -- could also help the extreme right.
Raffarin says the vote has no national significance, but it does fall midway before presidential and parliamentary polls in 2007.
Bureau Report
But with right and left running roughly equal in opinion polls,the Raffarin government`s economic policies of privatisation, deregulation and cost-cutting reforms look likely to stay.
An opinion poll in the daily Le Monde said 70 percent of those surveyed last week wanted to ``show their discontent`` with the government in the voting for regional assemblies.
After the Madrid bombings, terror threats in France, both from a shadowy Islamic group and blackmailers warning of an attack on the railways -- could also help the extreme right.
Raffarin says the vote has no national significance, but it does fall midway before presidential and parliamentary polls in 2007.
Bureau Report