© EPA-EFE
French far-right presidential candidates Marine Le Pen and Eric Zemmour have collected the 500 signatures needed to participate in the presidential election. This is evident from the charges published by the Constitutional Council on Tuesday.
source† BELGA
Zemmour garnered 620 signatures from elected officials, Le Pen 503. The latter suspended her campaign recently until it reached 500 signatures.
Nicolas Dupont-Aignan, head of the far-right party Debout la France, can also officially run, with 532 signatures.
Far-left Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the only candidate from the divided and weak left of the political spectrum to have more than ten percent in opinion polls, declared on Twitter that he had enough signatures. “I was committed to sponsoring another candidate if I got more than 500 signatures,” he said, and announced that he would support Philippe Bhutto from Wednesday.
Candidates have until 6 pm on Friday to submit their signatures to the Constitutional Council. The latter must then check whether the signatures come from elected officials from at least 30 different administrations.
Incumbent President Emmanuel Macron, who has yet to officially run for office, already received 500 signatures some time ago. The president is expected to announce his candidacy on Friday, the day of the deadline.
Valerie Pecres (LR), Anne Hidalgo (PS), Yannick Gadot (Les Verts), Fabien Roussel (PCF), Jean LaSalle (who founded the Resistons! in 2017 to support his presidential campaign) and Nathalie Artaud (Lote Auvrier) have enough signatures.
The first round of presidential elections will be held on April 10 and the second round on April 24.
