France’s far-right National Front (FN) is widely predicted to win control of at least one region for the first time, as the country holds regional elections three weeks after the deadly attacks in Paris.
Both leader Marine Le Pen and her niece were expected to perform strongly in the first round of the poll on Sunday, as they capitalise on their anti-immigration and sometimesIslamophobic message. Polls opened at 08:00 (07:00 GMT) and will close at 20:00 (19:00 GMT), with some 44 million people eligible to vote.
Ballots are cast under tight security with France in a state of emergency after the attacks on the capital on November 13, in which 130 people were killed. First projections are expected at 19:00 GMT. Le Pen is on course to top the poll in the economically depressed Nord-Pas-de-Calais-Picardie region in the north, once a bastion of the left.
Her 25-year-old niece Marion Marechal-Le Pen, meanwhile, seems to be heading for an equally strong score in the vast southeastern Provence-Alpes-Cote d’Azur region, which includes beaches thronged by sun-seekers in the summer. Opinion polls give the FN between 27 percent and 30 percent of the vote in the first round, a similar score to the centre-right Republicans led by former president .
Aljazeera.
