Sarkozy heads French presidential race

Conservative Nicolas Sarkozy still the front-runner as France's volatile presidential race sped into its last week today.

His closest rival Segolene Royal meanwhile insisted that France was ready to make her its first woman president.

Although opinion polls have shown Mr Sarkozy - a former law-and-order interior minister - leading by several percentage points since the beginning of the year, Ms Royal remained confident.

"Women's time has come," Ms Royal, a regional lawmaker, was quoted as saying in an interview in Sunday's Journal de Dimanche. "I think I'm going to win."

A poll released today suggested the contrary.

According to the sounding by the Ipsos agency for Le Point newsweekly, Mr Sarkozy would garner 29.5% of the April 22 first-round vote, followed by Ms Royal with 25% and Francois Bayrou - whose promises to bridge France's traditional right-left divide have catapulted him into third place - with 17.5%.

Only the top two vote-getters qualify for the second round, to be held on May 6. The poll suggested Mr Sarkozy would take 53% compared with 47% for Ms Royal in the second round.

Mr Sarkozy would lose in a round-two match-up with Mr Bayrou, however, taking 46.5% compared with Mr Bayrou's 53.5%.

Still, the sounding showed many French voters are still on the fence. Nearly one in five of those who said they were sure to cast a ballot next Sunday did not give their candidate of choice.

The telephone poll of 1,355 people was conducted on April 12-14. No margin of error was provided, but for polls of this size it usually falls within the 3% range.