Approaching a Crucial Vote

THE most crucial national election in recent French history drew closer last week--and so did the rival forces. The latest nationwide poll, published by the Paris daily Le Figaro, showed that the leftist coalition headed by Socialist Francois Mitterrand had dropped from 46% to 43% in its share of the popular vote. The governing Gaullists had 38% --up 1% from the previous week's results--while independent, middle-of-the-road reformist parties had 16% of the vote, a gain of 3%.

In France, as elsewhere, polls are intriguing but uncertain barometers. Most observers attributed the rise in support for the rightist and centrist parties to the concerted political scare strategy of the Gaullists. Blithely ignoring a constitutional provision that France's President is above partisan politics, Georges Pompidou, in a television interview, spearheaded a Gaullist campaign designed to convince French voters that a leftist victory would mean chaos at best, a Communist takeover at worst. To which Gaullist Premier Pierre Messmer added a prediction that it would bring about "a demolition of the Fifth Republic."

Some observers feel that the Gaullist campaign may cause a change in traditional voting patterns. French voters, who ballot twice on consecutive Sundays in the elections for the National Assembly,* have generally shifted on the second ballot to give bigger votes to the first-round leaders. Some voters who go Socialist may shift to candidates of such centrist parties as the Radicals or Center Democrats. But Center Democratic Leader Jean Lecanuet wooed the undecided strongly last week in a rally at Rennes by promising that if no clear majority emerged from the election, his party would help keep the Gaullists in power.

Despite the significance of the elections, there was a curious lack of excitement last week on the hustings. The pro-Socialist Paris weekly Nouvel Observateur commented on how different was the West German election last fall that returned Chancellor Willy Brandt to power. "Over there one felt the elan in the air. One felt that the entire population was intensely concerned with the choice before them."

By contrast, the crowds in France were modest and the candidates lethargic. Socialist Mitterrand, for instance, spent part of the week at rallies in the rural departments of Nievre and Saone-et-Loire southeast of Paris, where he is already well known as mayor of the town of Chateau-Chinon, president of Nievre's departmental council and "our Deputy" in the National Assembly. "This is his fief," said one peasant in the farming town of Montsauche (pop. 850). "Around here he is simply known as Franc,ois."

Driving from village to village through heavy snow in a chauffeured limousine, Mitterrand greeted dozens of supporters by their first names and cracked a few mild, homey jokes. At the chilly town hall of Montsauche, commenting on the isolation of the area's pine-studded hills, he recalled how "my friend Jacques here and I once lost our way only a few kilometers from the village--and don't think we had made too many stops in the cafe around the corner."

Generally, Mitterrand's audiences wanted to hear about "our concerns here at home," in the words of one Montsauche voter, a pharmacist named Marcel Roblin. These concerns include inadequacies of water supply, telephone service and electricity. Instead Mitterrand concentrated on the national fight between France's left-wing and right-wing parties.

Mitterrand scorns Gaullist charges that a leftist victory would destroy France and implications that Pompidou would never allow a Socialist-Communist coalition government to attain power. Premier Messmer had claimed that for Pompidou to do so would amount to "betrayal of the President's mandate from the country." Countered Mitterrand: "If the President does not accept a government proposed by the Assembly, he will fail in his constitutional obligation."

Between speaking engagements, in an interview with TIME Correspondent Friedel Ungeheuer, Mitterrand conceded that he was still fighting an uphill battle despite the coalition's lead at the polls. "I am not so sure we will have the majority to form a coalition government," he said. "The country is tired of the ruling majority; about that there is no doubt. The polls have given us 45% of the electorate. The problem is with the remaining 5%."

National Force. Win or lose, he insisted, the rebirth of socialism as a national force in France is more significant than the prospect of winning a national election. "I never thought we would move this fast after making our alliance with the Communists. I thought it would take several elections to grow as far as we have."

Mitterrand claims that there is no friction between himself and Communist Leader Georges Marchais, even though they differ on many policies. What about Marchais's argument that only the Communists are strong enough to guarantee support for any joint programs? Mitterrand's answer: "Marchais is naturally concerned with his party's remaining the larger one. It will take some doing for us to garner the 5,000,-000 votes on which they can always count as a hard core. It will not be easy to outdistance them."

If a Socialist-Communist coalition should come to power, Mitterrand told Ungeheuer, there would be "no objective change" in France's policy toward the U.S. "We would probably put a stop to the little bits of nastiness and harassment," Mitterrand said. "Americans are a very sound, very open and very balanced people. If only their foreign policy were as sound."

* This year 3,140 candidates from 15 parties are vying for 490 seats in the Assembly. In the complicated French voting system, the leading candidates in each electoral district, after the March 4 election, will compete the following Sunday in a runoff.

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