PARIS—Support for François Hollande, the presidential candidate for France's Socialist party, narrowed against that for current French President Nicolas Sarkozy two days ahead of the first round of elections, according to a poll Thursday.
A survey carried out from April 18-19 by pollster CSA showed Mr. Hollande's lead over
Mr. Sarkozy had tightened compared with the results of an April 16-17 poll. In the latest survey, voting intentions for Mr. Hollande fell to 28% from 29%, while those for Mr. Sarkozy rose to 25% from 24%, the pollster said.
In a second-round runoff between the two men, Mr. Hollande would beat Mr. Sarkozy 57% to 43%, the poll forecast. The margin is 2 percentage points narrower than in the previous poll, which showed Mr. Hollande leading Mr. Sarkozy 58% to 42%.
Far-right candidate Marine Le Pen had 16% support, down 1 percentage point from the previous poll, while voting intentions for the far-left's Jean-Luc Melenchon fell to 14.5% from 15%. Meanwhile, support for centrist candidate François Bayrou gained 0.5 percentage point to 10.5%.
The poll surveyed 1,005 registered voters.
