In interviews today, far-right leader Mr Jean-Marie Le Pen said he was confident of becoming France's next president.
He insisted that despite polls which give him between 20 and 26 per cent of the vote, he still had a chance of winning on Sunday because France's whole political system had been destabilised by his first round victory.
"I have said I would regard 30 percent as a real defeat. Between 30 and 40 per cent would be a very honourable defeat with serious hopes for the future," he said.
> With only six days to go to the presidential run-off against President Mr Jacques Chirac, the 73-year-old National Front (FN) leader is relishing the attention of a national press that normally ignores him.
But election rules oblige the press to give Mr Le Pen as much time as his rival.
"All the forces of the French establishment are coming together, hand in hand. The [employers' federation] Medef and the Communist Party, Monsignor Lustiger [Archbishop of Paris] and the masonic lodges. . . . It's unanimity thanks to Le Pen," he said.
"Members of the union of the privileged are all in league. . . . Only the people are on my side," the FN leader said.
Mr Le Pen stunned France eight days ago when he won through to the second round of the country's presidential election, beating Socialist Prime Minister Mr Lionel Jospin into third place. He faces the 69 year-old Chirac in the decider on Sunday.
Mr Le Pen also spoke of his admiration for British former prime minister Margaret Thatcher and US former president Ronald Reagan for taking on and humbling their countries' trade unions.
In Ouest-Francenewspaper, Mr Le Pen denied charges that he was a racist.
"When I hear the slogans, 'Le Pen racist or xenophobe,' I want to laugh. It is true that I say, 'I love my daughters better than my nieces, and my nieces better than my cousins, and my cousins better than my neighbours.' But I never said I hated my neighbours!" he said.
AFP