Chirac and Jospin make last appeals to undecided

Irish Times
May 26, 2005

Lara Marlowe in Paris

France: With only four days to go before France votes on the European
constitutional treaty, and opinion polls showing a victory for the No
vote at around 53 per cent, President Jacques Chirac and the former
socialist prime minister Lionel Jospin are making last-ditch appeals
to undecided voters, a quarter of the electorate.

The de facto alliance between two politicians who endured a difficult
five-year cohabitation from 1997 until 2002, then battled for the
president’s office, is all the more ironic because both were once
considered hesitant Europeans. Mr Chirac has never lived down his
1978 “Appeal from Cochin” in which he said that advocates of a federal
Europe constituted “the party of the foreigner”.

This referendum campaign is often compared to the 1992 referendum on
the Maastricht Treaty, which passed by one percentage point. Mr Jospin
then embraced the idea of a single currency gingerly, telling the
French they should “sayNo to the No”.

Now the two former rivals are using the same arguments. In a
television appearance on Tuesday night, Mr Jospin made the obligatory
dig at the right-wing government, saying: “It’s not easy to win a
referendum with a government as unpopular as this one.”

Taking up one of Mr Chirac’s favourite themes, Jospin said the No
votes were “incompatible” with each other. “Le Pen says that if the No
wins, France should leave the Union. Olivier Besancenot [ of the
Communist RevolutionaryLeague] demands a meeting of the Estates
General of the social movement. Marie-George Buffet [ the communist
leader] says we’ll have a different treaty thanks to the mobilisation
of progressive forces, when almost all of them in Europe are for the
Yes. Laurent Fabius says the treaty is unacceptable, but if there are
three changes it’s fine . . . Are we going to mix them all up in a
cocktail shaker and ask the president of the republic to present the
shaker to our astounded European partners?” Mr Jospin asked
sarcastically.

Asked what advice he had to offer to Mr Chirac for his “solemn
address” on French television tonight, Mr Jospin said: “Smile.”

Smiling may not come easily to the French president. The atmosphere at
the Elysee Palace is said to be morose. In a background chat with
journalists this week, Mr Chirac reportedly admitted a No vote would
be a personal failure that would destroy his international stature.

In his speech tonight, Mr Chirac will avoid over-dramatising the
consequences of a No vote. For the last time, he will explain what is
at stake for France and Europe, and praise the French for having held
such a vigorous debate.

Mr Chirac has cast a wide net in recent days, writing to the Council
of Armenian Organisations to tell them that the constitutional treaty
would complicate Turkish entry to the EU. Speaking via radio to 1.4
milliovoters in French overseas possessions, he told them they stood
to lose European subsidies if France votes No.

Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin and the former president Valery
Giscard d’Estaing appear to be the only politicians on the right who
believe the Yes side can still win. “The die are not cast; the French
are waiting until thelast few hours [ to decide],” Mr Raffarin told
LCI television yesterday.

Earlier, he told the BBC that unlike Denmark after Maastricht and
Ireland after Nice, it would be impossible to ask the French to vote
again because “France doesn’t say Yes one day, No another.”

Other right-wing leaders have given up hope. “It will be a small No or
a big No,” predicted Nicolas Sarkozy, the leader of the UMP party. Mr
Sarkozy’s cancellation of a television appearance at the beginning of
the week led to speculation in the press about marital
difficulties. French politicians’ private lives are usually taboo, but
Nicolas and Cecilia Sarkozy presented themselves as a Kennedy-like
political team.

The steam seems to have gone out of the campaign, with both sides
complaining of exhaustion. The left-wing Yes camp will hold two final
rallies tomorrow night, in Lille and Toulouse, with the Spanish prime
minister Jose Luis Zapatero and the German chancellor Gerhard
Schröder.

The left-wing No camp are reportedly squabbling about who will be
invited to its last rally of socialists, communists, ecologists and
anti-globalisation activists.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress