Chirac urges left and right to block Le Pen

On the eve of France’s presidential election, conservative incumbent Jacques Chirac urged voters to assure his landslide victory and reject the anti-foreigner views of his ultra-right opponent, Jean-Marie Le Pen.

Campaigning officially ended at midnight in one of the most divisive presidential races in modern French history.

‘‘In the exceptional situation we find ourselves in today,’’ Mr Chirac told France-Inter radio Friday, ‘‘we must defend the values that all non-extremist Frenchmen have in common.’’

During the 12-day campaign, Mr Chirac has called his race against the far-right former paratrooper ‘‘the fight of my life’’.

Polls indicate that the 69-year-old President will sweep tomorrow’s election with overwhelming support from voters of all political stripes, buoyed by a mass popular rejection of Mr Le Pen’s extremist platform.

Nonetheless, Mr Chirac sounded a last-minute plea to left-leaning voters, urging them to ‘‘stand in the way’’ of Le Pen, whom he called ‘‘an extremely dangerous’’ man.

The President said that vision for France best encompassed ‘‘the interests of all the French’’.

Mr Le Pen, 73, who once called the Nazi gas chambers ‘‘a detail of history,’’ says that if elected he will deport all illegal immigrants and assure French citizens priority in jobs, housing and social benefits. He says he will pull France out of the European Union and restore the franc as its currency.

In an interview with the American CBS evening news on Friday, Mr Le Pen said his party ‘‘does not have anything in its programme which could be considered as fascist’’.

‘‘I love my country, but that doesn’t mean I hate other countries. I don’t have tendency to xenophobia. I am just a Francophile,’’ he said.

Ahead of tomorrow’s vote, Le Pen predicted foul play.

‘‘We are going to witness an enormous enterprise of fraud,’’ he told a news conference yesterday, in remarks that appeared aimed at preparing his supporters for defeat.

As a purported example, Mr Le Pen held up two ballots - one for Mr Chirac and one for himself. The one for the President was slightly whiter, which Mr Le Pen said was an effort to make voting for him less desirable - if only subliminally.

He complained that his campaign posters were not being pinned up, that postal carriers were refusing to deliver his election manifesto to French households and that his supporters were being harassed

He called it ‘‘a climate of totalitarianism’’ and said his campaign director would meet with election authorities to discuss those issues. He also indicated that he might contest the election result if his performance appeared to be abnormally low.

A poll published yesterday in daily Le Figaro indicated that Mr Chirac would win between 75% and 82% of the vote and Mr Le Pen would receive between 18% and 25%. The survey of 1,012 registered voters was conducted between April 30 and May 2 by the Ipsos polling agency.

Mr Le Pen has been the subject of nationwide protests since his electoral upset in the April 21 first round, which qualified him for tomorrow’s runoff against Mr Chirac and pushed Socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin out of the running.